PARMA, Ohio — The family of 3-year-old Rayven Bowen is demanding answers after the little girl managed to run away from staff at a Parma day care center onto Chevrolet Boulevard, a busy four-lane road, on May 9.
According to an Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services report filed by Cleveland Children's Daycare Academy, the little girl had to be rescued from the busy street by a passing driver who stopped her car and safely recovered the child.
Still, Rayven's mother Monique Pritchard believes staff at the facility owes the family an apology and explanation as to how the child was able to run away into the street nearly a quarter-mile away.
“It's uncalled for, I have no words," Pritchard said. "I mean, if you were here looking at the distance and being here, I don’t see how she made it there.”
Pritchard's cousin, Skye Griggs, told News 5 the day care center needs to take a more active role in evaluating its safety protocol.
“The day care was kind of blaming her, the child for the situation, and that was just baffling to us because she’s a kid," Griggs said. “Mistakes do happen, and I don’t think we’re trying to bash the facility as a whole, but I just feel the way that they treated the situation.”
Grigg's continued, “It should have been their first main concern to reach out and try to figure out a plan, but the first thing they did was try to get her kicked out. They said it just didn’t work for them. She's three, you know, children try to do a lot of things, so their initial response should have been an apology and a solution to not let this happen again.”
News 5 made three phone calls and visited Cleveland Children's Daycare Academy to get its response to the incident, but we're still waiting for a statement.
Meanwhile, Pritchard told News 5 the day care did send her a text after News 5 tried to reach management. Pritchard said the text essentially offered an apology, and an assurance that steps will be taken to keep her daughter and other children safe.
Pritchard said parents should constantly be evaluating the safety of their day care centers, and said she would love to meet the woman who rescued her daughter from a busy street.
"I just want to thank her for being my daughter’s guardian angel," Pritchard said. “The fact that she ran into traffic to get her is phenomenal, and I would just like to thank her, as well as the other lady who helped to gather all the other children in the parking lot.”
