I'm Jill Anderson.This is the Harvard EdCast. Cheryl Shakespeare says school systems need to change to better safeguard students against educator sexual misconduct.She spent decades researching sexual abuse that happens in K-12 schools.
She writes about it in her book, Organizational Betrayal.She says school cultures and institutional structures are often complicit when sexual misconduct happens.
Recent studies estimate about 17% of students report being the target of sexual misconduct by a school employee.She points out there isn't a lot of data and reporting these incidents is part of the work that needs to be done.
First, I asked her what sexual misconduct looks like in schools.
So sexual misconduct is targeting a student in a sexual way.It could be language.It could be behaviors.It could be sharing pornographic materials.
The behaviors can be any place from playing with their hair and talking to them about sex, to hugging in a sexual way, to sexual intercourse.It's a range of behaviors.Physically, those are the common ways this happens.
Sometimes they use social media to have sexual conversations or share sexual information or ask students to take off their clothes and send pictures, and they send pictures back to the students.
It's a combination of behaviors, but all focused on an adult targeting a student for some kind of sexualized activity.It happens across all grades.There's some differences between what we see
For kids in elementary school, as opposed to middle school and high school, middle school and high school are more similar.Elementary school targeting tends to be direct sexual physical contact with children.
Middle and high school is that, but also social media and other kinds of contact.
Another thing that we should probably make note of is that this is happening both male and female. that there's a tendency for us to only hear about these things when they make national news.And yet it's happening a lot.The circumstances really vary.
Yeah.I mean, we see sexual misconduct in all kinds of schools, public schools, religious schools, independent, expensive private schools. We see it in all kinds of grades and in all kinds of settings.
You've said that the solution to this is relatively simple, but difficult to implement.Why?
Well, I say it's simple because most of the behaviors are seen by other people.I've studied this in a lot of different ways, but one of the most revealing ways is through having been an expert witness in about 250 cases.
And as an expert witness, you get to see all the interviews of the students, the parents, the other teachers, the administrators, plus you get to see their school policies and the training.
So you get a really 360 degree understanding of what happened.And I use that in my research.In fact, I agreed to be an expert witness only if I can use what I learn from this in my research, because it's very hard to study this as an outsider.
If I call up and say, hey, I want to talk to you as a principal about educator sexual misconduct in your schools, that principal's not going to talk to me.
So this was an opportunity for me to be able to understand something with data that is more reliable and more revealing than I could have ever gotten in any other of my research methods that I use.
And so within those studies, what I find is that teachers see things, kids see things, administrators see things, parents see things.
And what they see are what I call red flags of possible problems, but certainly what they see are boundary crossings.Teachers are crossing a professional boundary and they don't report it.And they don't report it for lots of reasons.
The foremost reason they don't report it is because they don't realize they're supposed to report it.Nobody's taught them or helped them understand that these are signs that a child might be being targeted for sexual misconduct.
Even if they do understand that, they don't understand that they have a responsibility, not only ethically, but from a legal standpoint.
Even if they understand that, they often don't want to report because they're afraid they're going to get someone in trouble.What if they're wrong?I mean, they're only seeing a certain thing.They don't know for sure.
And so very often you hear people say, well, I didn't report it because I didn't see them actually having sex.I didn't see them naked in the classroom having a sexual act. So why I say it's not so hard, this isn't a complicated fix.
The fix is to understand what the signs are that someone's crossing boundaries and report it.And then the next step is that it gets investigated and that that person gets closer supervision to make sure they don't cross boundaries anymore.
That's really pretty simple.
That's not a hard thing to do.What are some of those key warning signs that administrators, teachers, students should be trained to see and possibly step in and prevent one of these incidents from happening.
We might start with seeing a teacher take a student home from school.That's not allowed.
Now, there might be reasons for it, and there may be an exception, and they may have cleared it with the principal just for that one time, but it needs to be reported.
Another is seeing a teacher with the same student over and over again in their classroom, before school, during breaks, and after school.Seeing the door shut with a single student in the room.
Seeing the window to the classroom covered up in a poster or some other thing that looks like it's just an informational thing, but really it's covering up the window.
Seeing an adult working in a school who spends time after school, again, alone with just a few students or with just one student.Listening to the kids.The kids almost always know something's going on.
And so walking down the hall, you might hear a kid say, he's really creepy.Look at how he interacts with so-and-so.Or look at this.Or, ooh, he was touching my hair and just wiggling it around.And it just gave me the creeps.
And those aren't always just overheard conversations.Those are often conversations that kids tell other teachers or other people.You know, this is a really creepy teacher.This is what he's doing.Or you need to take a look at Mr. So-and-so or Ms.
So-and-so and see what's happening in the classroom.And kids tell people that and people don't respond.
As your work highlights, there's a huge organizational behavior issue and a cultural one.And you just sort of mentioned how we often just turn a blind eye to these things and they're happening right in front of us.
Or some other cases, a leader may feel like they need to protect the soul system, so they don't want to make a report.Or even this fear I think all of us sometimes have that we will make a false accusation of someone.
How can we distinguish between what you might consider a safe behavior versus one that is misconduct?
So what I would say is it's not my job to distinguish between them.If it's behavior that could be misconduct, report it.If you smell smoke in a school, you don't say, hmm, I think that's safe smoke.
You say, I'm a little concerned I'm smelling smoke coming out of the lower floors or something.You report it.So the point is is that it's not up to me as an observer to have to make that distinction.
I don't have enough information to make that distinction. I don't have the skills.I'm not an investigator.I need to report that I'm concerned about what I see.I don't know what it means.Principal, it's over to you.You need to do something.
But at the same time, as someone who has seen something, you have a responsibility to make sure something gets done.You follow up and say, did you investigate that?Has that moved forward?Because you're still the reporter.
You're still somebody who saw something. Although mandated reporter laws, depending upon the state, don't necessarily overlap with what you might see a school person do.In some states they do, and in some states they don't.
The point is, we have a responsibility as educators to report and to follow up.But I know it's a big hurdle to overcome.Well, what if I'm making a mistake?What if I'm you know, ruining someone's career.
And what I would say is I really haven't seen anybody's career ruined with a report that wasn't of concern.You know, so they might make a report.They may find that gets investigated.They find out this is not an issue.
We've told the person, you know, they can't do that anymore, but we're watching them, but really we're seeing nothing else.It doesn't ruin their career.It doesn't harm them.It's the same thing as if you see somebody driving recklessly, you report it.
And so I think we need to understand that our power to harm someone by a false accusation is not really there.That's not gonna really happen.
But what can really happen is if we don't report, what we're doing is we're possibly allowing that abuse to continue.
That's one of the things is the more you can understand, there are plenty of reasons why somebody might take a kid home from school, or might be alone in a room with a kid, with the door shut.
And so what the principle helps them understand is you don't need to shut the door.You know, this isn't necessary.You can sit at your desk.They can sit at their desk.
You can have a conversation, just the two of you, if this is something that needs to be talked about that way.You can come to the counselor's office.You can meet in another space where people know you're there.There's lots of ways to do these things.
And so it's also a teaching moment where somebody who has good intentions might be crossing a boundary and just doesn't understand that. You can help them understand that and help them to also accomplish what they want to accomplish in a safe way.
I don't want to generalize about all the cases, but in some of the cases that I read, there were people who kind of stepped in and said something about this doesn't look right.And people seem to be getting that.
But along the way in the process, something is breaking down to actually stop something before it either progresses or... Absolutely right.
So that first step we've been talking about, the first person who sees something, and then they report it.Well, okay, so here's what goes wrong at the next step.
The next step is the principal, let's say, this is very common, the principal is also a coach and coaches with the person.And they think they know that this person isn't, yeah, the person's a little nutty, but I know him, nothing to worry about.
Or the person's an outstanding teacher, And everybody really looks at how much that outstanding teacher contributes and thinks that it's just not possible.This person's just great.
And so again, at the next level, people make decisions not to follow up, not to investigate, not to supervise, not to keep an eye on, because they already have a predetermined opinion about the person who has been reported.So it stops there.
That's the end of it. They don't put things in the files.They don't move the report up so that it would be in the file that this report had been made.This is what I did and this was my conclusion.
Because if they could at least do that, you'd be able to follow how many reports got made over time and nothing happened.So somebody at the next level makes a decision that there's nothing going on.And so because most schools don't have
a really good set of policies and procedures about how this works, what you do when you get a complaint or an observation like that, how you document it, it falls through the cracks.
It feels crazy to think that it is 2024 and great policies and procedures around this still don't seem to exist.
Feels like it's being ignored.
It is being ignored.And the policies come in lots of different ways that you need.You need hiring policies about how you hire people so it's a safe hire.
You need supervision policies about supervising and what things you need to pay special attention to.You need policies that teach people what are appropriate and inappropriate actions and what are boundaries. They can't be crossed.
There's a wide range of policies that need to be in policy manuals.And many of those policies cover other things as well.So it isn't that it's necessarily a policy.
For instance, the hiring policies aren't necessarily a policy about sexual misconduct, but they're policies about who you call to check references, questions you ask when you check references, follow-up you have in previous jobs.
And so what I see is that we may have a policy on Title IX.And of course, under Title IX, if the school receives federal funds, this is prohibited, but it doesn't specify the issues of adult to student sexual misconduct.
So people don't often know that that's part of Title IX.In fact, most people just think of Title IX as sports and teams.So you may have your general Title IX policy,
but you don't have anything in there that indicates that this kind of activity is prohibited in schools under Title IX.You also don't have anything that makes it clear that behavior such as this can violate criminal laws.These are minors.
The people at schools are not minors, and so you have those issues.So there are a number of policies, and I find that even shockingly, even in many cases, the most rudimentary policies aren't in the policy books in the cases I've looked at.
Now remember, I have a kind of quote unquote biased sample or a selective sample where I'm looking at schools where something has happened.
But if you're figuring 10 to 20, I'm rounding up a little bit, not to be alarmist, that's 10 to 20% of kids may experience this in their school.That's a fairly good amount to have a lapse in this type of policy and procedure.
I mean, the goal, I would guess, would be to have 0%, ultimately, no one having this happen, so.Right.
And, you know, I mean, policies are only the first step. But if you don't have policies, you don't have any guidance for people to understand their responsibilities.
I want to talk a little bit about the long-term effects of these incidents on victims.What can you tell me about what happens to some of these kids who experience this in their schools?
What I would say is very often the student who's targeted is a vulnerable student.And I use that word cautiously because every student is vulnerable.Every student comes with vulnerabilities.
No matter how high achieving they are, no matter what their family life is like, we all have our vulnerabilities.So these vulnerabilities may look different in many students.
So in some students, it's that they come from a home in which there's not a lot of supervision.For other students, it's that they have drug or alcohol or some other abuse problems.
For other students, it's that they don't have good self-image, don't feel good about themselves. For others, it's that they're lonely, you know, so there's just a range of things that make a student vulnerable and in some ways I say.
That means every student, because every student is vulnerable.So someone who can identify their vulnerability.So it isn't that there aren't students who wouldn't be vulnerable.If someone can identify what their vulnerability is, they're at risk.
And so that, for me, means pretty much every student.So this relationship, quote unquote, amplifies those vulnerabilities.And very often in the relationship, the adult is in control. And what the adult says has great meaning.
So if the adult says, that was a stupid thing you just did, or don't be stupid and tell anybody, or you're not as pretty as you think you are, or you could ruin my entire life if you told.
So the kinds of things that get said also reinforce those vulnerabilities.What we find is that once students understand that this is a sexually exploitive interaction, they start to question everything. Well, no, I am no good.No, I am a nothing.
No, I am stupid because how did I fall for this?No, it was all a lie.How could I trust anybody?And so you add those kinds of responses where students are groomed to lie to their parents, usually groomed to stay away from friends.
So usually in these situations, People move away from their friends.They stop having friendships.They stop talking to people.They've been pulled away from their parents so they don't have that relationship.And so they're isolated.
And very often drugs and alcohol are used, especially for middle and high school kids, are used as part of the whole grooming and abuse situation.And they're brought into a world that they're too young to understand.
And that is very harmful and damning in the long run.And then often, They get pregnant, they're forced into abortions if it's females.They're moved out of their house and into some other place.
So there's, depending upon the patterns of what the abuse looks like, it's isolation, it's control, and it's denigration.It's a positive thing here, a negative thing there, a positive thing, a negative thing.
And so that is just something that most of us can't deal with, let alone adolescents and kids who are even younger.
This is probably one of the worst things that could happen to your child.And oftentimes, families, parents, guardians, we put kind of a blind trust, I think, into school employees that everyone is there for the right reasons.
Is there anything families, parents, guardians should do to be better advocates for their children?
Yes.I'll start out, though, with saying that people who are targeting kids also target their parents. A typical thing might be a single mom who's working a job and has kids and has really got her hands full.
And a teacher comes along and says, oh, I'll help.And this teacher, he's a coach.He's well-known.He's seen as one of the great guys in the school.And the mom thinks, oh, thank goodness.I mean, I don't, my husband's not here.I don't have a husband.
There's no father figure here.There's no good strong male models. Here's this great teacher taking my son to baseball games, getting him into camping, doing all these things.
Well, in fact, what the person is doing is those things, but also sexually abusing the kid.So understanding that as a parent, you may be groomed by the person who wants to harm your child so that you trust that person.
Now, I don't want to say that you shouldn't trust teachers. Again, we're going back to what is appropriate behavior between teacher and student, or between school employee and student.
So one is to be careful and try to understand the motivations that may come forward.
Another is to ask lots of questions, to check social media, to check what's on TikTok, what's on Instagram, to control things, especially among middle and high school, to have a lot more control than many people have.
And I know that's hard, but that's where a lot of the information comes, is through the telephone.Now, I will tell you that some people will buy a student their own telephone and tell them to hide it and only use that telephone with the teacher.
But again, these are things, as a parent, you need to check on.And then ask lots of questions.Know where your child is.If the child's staying after school, find out what's going on. Who's bringing my child home?What is going on?
So it's an amount of oversight that takes a lot of energy.And I'm sympathetic because parenting is really hard.If you have concerns at any level, report it.Report it and follow up.What did you find out?What's going on?How is this happening?
It doesn't mean you'll be welcomed in your report.So be prepared. to be at sometimes, you know, demonized.Oh, that's that crazy parent again.You are doing what a loving, careful parent does.
You're steering your child through very difficult circumstances in their lives.Adolescence is really tough and you're steering them through.But be prepared to get labeled as that difficult parent.
Well, Cheryl, there's a lot that we could keep talking about.And I think a lot of this is difficult to discuss, but necessary.
It is difficult to discuss.It's demoralizing.I mean, we expect our schools to be places that are looking out for our kids and the people there are kind and good.And in fact, most of them are.
Most of them are people who care about kids, who care about people, who are honest, who have good ethics.That's the good part.But as in every profession, there are those who aren't.That's the sad part.
Charles Shakespeare is a distinguished professor in the School of Education at Virginia Commonwealth University.She's the author of Organizational Betrayal, How Schools Enable Sexual Misconduct and How to Stop It.I'm Jill Anderson.
This is the Harvard EdCast produced by the Harvard Graduate School of Education.Thanks for listening.
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