Child Sexual Abuse in the Classroom
By Julie M. Quist
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It seems utterly peculiar that states would pass laws to tighten up enforcement of child sexual abuse in churches and private institutions, but not in schools. When the extent of child sexual abuse in the classroom is revealed, however, that peculiarity becomes a public scandal.
The 2002 federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), for all its shortcomings, quietly mandated a study of sexual abuse in U.S. schools. The Department of Education 2004 report of that mandated study called sexual abuse in the schools “a serious problem in our nation’s schools.”
Physical sexual abuse of children in schools was 6.7 percent of all students. Professor Charol Shakeshaft, author of the study and a researcher at Hofstra University in Long Island, N.Y., puts it this way: “Of the approximately 45 million students attending public and private K-12 schools, more than 3 million will have been the target of physical sexual exploitation by an employee of the school by eleventh grade.”
Most teachers, of course, are not sexual predators. But remember the outrage over sexual abuse by Catholic clergy? This data on school abuse dwarfs the scandal in the Catholic Church. No better example exists of twisted media bias. Congregations went bankrupt and individuals were exposed, scorned and prosecuted under relentless camera lights until justice was accomplished.
How about the school abuse scandal? When time limits for child sexual abuse lawsuits are removed, schools are exempted. According to Citizen magazine, damages school victims can recover are severely limited. Yet Citizen reports that “from 1 percent to 5 percent of the teaching profession and up to 25 percent of all public school districts have problems of sexual abuse.”
Child sexual abuse will stop when the most common place of abuse is targeted. Why are schools out of the public spotlight on sexual abuse?
Invading the Homes
By Julie M. Quist
“If NCLB was a federal take-over of local schools, this proposed second version of NCLB would be a take-over of our families,” I stated last week. In the name of resolving difficult problems for a limited number of families, an entire system is being proposed by powerful players that would invade the homes of all families.
Since the idea may sound alarmist or far-fetched, here’s an example of exactly that. Reacting to the tragic death in 2000 of an abused 8-year-old illegal immigrant from the Ivory Coast, England passed The Children Act of 2004, which empowered the British Government to establish a surveillance system of all their 12 million children from birth.
A mammoth government database, expected to be operational in two years, will track details, including the portions of fruit and vegetables children eat per day. Who knows how to measure this, but practical applicationss are never an issue.
The disturbing irony is that the child’s death was a failure of the bureaucrats themselves, the dozens of social workers, nurses, doctors, and police officers who visited her but refused to intervene for fear of being accused of racism, since the workers handling the case were black. Such ineptitude is rewarded with massive new powers over all English families.
The English system sets targets on “performance indicators” and reports on families meeting these targets. “Performance indicators” are government defined outcomes, exactly what U.S. state and federal requirements for early childhood are putting in place today.
Two warning flags from English doctors, schools and police on any indicators initiates an investigation, when detailed information is gathered. For example, “Is the parent providing a positive role model?”
Government powers know no limits but those imposed on it by active, involved moms and dads driven by their boundless love for their children.
Freedom of Religion
By Julie M. Quist
Last year, Minnesota passed the American Heritage Education Act which encourages teaching America’s religious heritage in public schools. The law protects teachers from threats of lawsuits should they include original sources supportive of America’s religious heritage.
Religion played a major role in America’s founding. The Preamble of many state constitutions give God thanks for our Religious and Civil Liberties. We’ve lost knowledge of the importance of religion, because our religious heritage and our founders’ expressions, documents, and proclamations of religious beliefs have been censored from current curricula.
Wouldn’t teaching about our nation’s religious foundations violate the “separation of church and state”? No, in fact, the Minnesota law passed to clear that up. Removing certain important historical facts because it’s religious is censorship, regardless of your personal beliefs.
Textbooks today identify the books and writings that influenced our founding, including major British and the French writers and ancient Rome and Greece civilizations. The Bible, however, is never identified as far and above the most referenced book of the time. That’s vital history that’s been removed.
When famous founders are quoted, their references to Divine Providence and prayer have been excised. Who is to know it's missing? Isn't that a distortion of our history? The Crusades, the Salem witch trials, and unusual sects remain, however. Only the negative stereotypes are left.
Teaching our history accurately with original sources is quite different from teaching religion. Removing our religious history is hostility toward religion, which is a violation of the first amendment’s right to freedom of religion. Many teachers, fearful to teach our religious past, now have this law to clarify their responsibility to teach history without hostility toward religion.
We must support and encourage school districts and teachers to include original sources showing the important role of religion in our Nation’s founding, and work to pass a similar law in every other state.
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