Recently a new student at my school pressed sexual harassment charges againts one of my teachers. The teacher in question, tries to act like a parent like figure. (pats you on the back, rubs your shoulder maybe). This teacher was a girls softball coach, as was forced to resign immediately. 2 weeks later, students have found out that he was forced to resign. One student, the daughter of the President of the Schoolboard satrted a petition to keep the teacher here. within 2 hours, 157 out of 248 students in my school has signed the petition. Today is suppose to be his last day of school. One of the problems with this, is, that he was the advanced math teacher. There will be no one to replace him for many weeks, and no substitutes can teach it. This teacher is a valuable asset to the school. he has been teaching there for the past 27 years, and is the best teacher there (in many peoples opinions). So, this one girl who just moved here, made a simple sexual harassment charge, and the teacher is gone? Just the accusation caused this. another thing is that, they may possibly make the math teachers wife resign also, which she is a 2rd grade teacher. So, if i didnt like one of my teachers, i could make an accusation and probably have them gone, it looks like.26 responses total.
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Get some of those bad ass black girls to deal with her. She'll fess up in no time. I'm sure she won't win any popularity contests at your school anyway.
The accuser is no longer going to our school, she was there for a short time, then left. the resignation is not final. no one(public) has officially been told.
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This accusation went throguh the school system, so nothing is made public.
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Who does this guy think he is? Arnold Schwarzenegger? Yes, when such a charge is made, the teacher is removed from contact with students while an investigation is in process. Gotta be done that way. Got a better suggestion? The petition was a nice thing to do though. But it can't reasonably be granted until a "full investigation" has been completed.
There hasn't been any investigation, and i doubt there will be one.
Call the ACLU.
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Its called "Zero Tolerance" and its nice to see it applied to both students and teachers in a "non-discriminatory" fashion. Its a nice policy for insurance companies as it allows them to collect smaller amounts of money from greater numbers of schools to bump up revenue to pay the revenue based bonus of their upper management types. It allows school management types to not actually have to do much more than apply such simple zero tolerance policies to any situation without having to expend any effort into actually figuring out what is going on. No need for such outmoded notions such as "common sense" and "judgement". (Legal disclaimer: I haven't a clue about the actual specifics of the events noted above. I have no Insurance and have taken great pains to make sure that I have little or no assets in my name legally so if you wanna sue me, good luck on getting anything out of it except legal bills owed to your lawyer.) This is the bed you liberals made, so enjoy sleeping in it.
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jlamb - don't let any of the posts here make it seem like this is an easy problem. It's clear there is real sexual harassment in the world, and also times when innocent or even friendly behavior is misconstrued (intentionally or unintentionally) as something more sinister. There ought to be a somber process for deciding which category a particular event falls into, that sets aside the many deep emotions that come up when such an accusation is made.
I think that there are often situations where people have different perceptions about things. It is completely possible that this teacher was touching the student in a way he sees as being innocent and helpful. The student however, may have felt genuinely harrassed. I know that I come from a family that doesnt do a lot of touching. I would have been very uncomfortable if a teacher hugged me in school. Anyhow, it isnt desirable to live in a society were people who are simply accused of something lose their jobs but it also is important to respect that the accuser's feelings about this may be real and valid.
resp:11 Zero tolerance gets to be a problem as far as violence, too. But in general, you can't touch students at all anymore. I tend to agree it's a little out of hand... anyway, I had a prof who asked students before making any sort of physicial contact whatsoever.
"May I shake your hand?"
LOL
I don't know what the facts are, either, but I think it's a good thing if: 1) A petition doesn't have much weight. Unless the petition-signers have actual knowledge of the event, they shouldn't have any say over how it's handled. A popular teacher would be able to harrass a new or unpopular student in any way at all if things were done that way. 2) The teacher's role in the school (ie, advanced math teacher) doesn't carry much weight. Nothing justifies harrassment. Even if you're in an important role for your students. 3) There's some sort of investigation. Looking at it one way, this girl came into school encountered a bad situation, tried to do what was needed, and is now ostracized right out of the school. Looking at it another way, a good teacher was canned for nothing at all, other than being accused, possibly by mistake. With no charges, the guy will never have to face the accusation again. He'll just go off to another school in a year or so and teach again. As long as he's innocent, that's fine. If he's not, he can victimize someone else. However, there's no way to vindicate yourself from such a situation. Even if he's found to be really innocent, having his name in the papers would probably really decrease his chances of working in the same state. I have no answers for that particular problem. I am not sure there are any good answers in that case.
I agree with jep on all counts. When I was teaching, I knew that I, like any teacher, was potentially vulnerable to such accusations. It affected my interactions with students in substantial ways, being careful not only to avoid any kind of harrassment, but to avoid anything that could be interpreted as harrassment, or any situation where it would be easy to fabricate a claim of harrassment (e.g., never close your office door when meeting with a student). And with all that, you still aren't safe. Teachers have to take what steps they can to protect themselves, but I always thought it was worth the price to be sure that the students were protected. I'd like it if there were a better way.
I have really mixed feelings about this. I think it's important to protect people from unwanted sexual advances. On the other hand, someone I know had to spend lots of money he couldn't really afford defending himself from a bogus sexual harassment lawsuit. All someone has to do to ruin your life these days, especially if you're male, is make the accusation. If you're in a particularly sensitive occupation, like a teacher, just the public accusation is enough to derail your career.
Women are sometimes accused of sexually inappropriate behavior too so while it is more common for this to happen to men, it isnt like women never have to worry about it either.
My mother is a middle-school teacher; both my girlfriend and my brother's are working on their teaching certificate's, and my mom's number one piece of advice to them is "never be alone in a room with one student". People need to be protected from sexual harassment, and accusations need to be taken seriously, but there comes a point where you can take the accusations *too* seriously. When people can cry rape whenever they dislike somebody, knowing that their target's reputation/family life/career will be trashed regardless of the truth, the false accusations will eventually drown out the real one, and the *real* harassment will go unaddressed. Teachers (and other public figures) need to heed the advice of "always have a witness", but accusations need to be investigated to every extent possible, and false accusations vigorously undone--every teacher falsely accused of harassment needs to be returned to hir classroom--when possible, so keep the signal from being lost in the noise. *Not* punishing the falsely accused is as important to the interests of victims as punishing the guilty.
I don't think totally false accusations of harassment are made very often. I think it's much less common than real harassment going unreported. Coming forward with such an accusation, true or false, isn't really all that easy.
Could be, but it's still the case that due process should precede judgement.
*should*, but probably never will.
*whore*
You have several choices: