The child was attending a summer program Friday morning at ExcellED Montessori Plus when she was found unresponsive in a bathroom, according to investigators.
SAN ANTONIO — For the third time in less than a year, emergency crews responded to a serious incident at a Boerne-area preschool. This time, a 6-year-old girl lost her life.
The child was attending a summer program Friday morning at ExcellED Montessori Plus when she was found unresponsive in a bathroom, according to the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office. Authorities say she may have suffered a seizure.
“My understanding is the little girl was still somewhat in an upright position when she was found,” said Bexar County Sheriff, Javier Salazar.
Salazar said the girl had known underlying health conditions. Investigators estimate she was in the bathroom for about two to five minutes before a teacher checked on her. Staff began CPR immediately, and the girl was transported by EMS to University Hospital, where she was pronounced dead shortly after 11:20 a.m.
“We don’t suspect foul play, but also we don’t want to rule anything out at this point,” Salazar said.
The sheriff’s office used advanced scanning equipment from the San Antonio Police Department to document the scene in detail.
Now, every moment leading up to the child’s death is under review.
This marks the third major incident at ExcellED Montessori Plus in just seven months.
In November, a teacher, Alfredo Marmolejo, was arrested after investigators say he was caught on camera physically assaulting three toddlers.
Three weeks later, in December, a parent reportedly experienced a medical episode in the parking lot. Her vehicle crashed through a fence into the playground, killing 22-year-old teacher Alexia Rosales and a one-year-old student, Mkaya Amrani.
“It’s very tragic that incident after incident keeps happening, and they’re still open,” said Landri Bishop, a parent who withdrew her sons from the school in March. “My first instinct is for it to close down. I think it just has bad juju if I’m being honest. There needs to be all new employees.”
Bishop said she began noticing alarming changes in her children’s behavior.
“Our oldest son started acting out, calling us names, and didn’t want to go to school,” she said. “My youngest son was getting bit all over his body.”
She says concerns grew after her older son began re-enacting what he said were interactions with a teacher — yelling and screaming in his face.
Bishop claims she asked to review surveillance footage, but claims the school only showed limited clips.
“They told me they lost the footage. ‘It doesn’t go back that far,’ is what they told us,” said Bishop. “I did not have any other help at the time and I literally felt sick dropping my kids off at school.”
Other red flags she shared didn’t happen inside the school building.
“Three or four times I noticed the kids left the gate open outside on the baby side and there’s toddlers running around in the parking lot,” she recalled.
In a statement following Friday’s incident, ExcellED Montessori Plus said their community is “grieving this loss deeply.” Grief counselors have been made available to staff and students, and the school said its thoughts and prayers remain with the child’s family.