The Shifting Institutionalization of PederastySexual misconduct plagues US schools: AP finds more than 2,500 teachers punished in 5 years
Sun Oct 21, 5:29 AM
UNDATED - The young teacher hung his head, avoiding eye contact. Yes, he had touched a fifth-grader's breast during recess. "I guess it was just lust of the flesh," he told his boss.
That got Gary C. Lindsey fired from his first teaching job in Oelwein, Iowa. But it didn't end his career. He taught for decades in Illinois and Iowa, fending off at least a half-dozen more abuse accusations.
When he finally surrendered his teaching license in 2004 - 40 years after that first little girl came forward - it wasn't a principal or a state agency that ended his career. It was one persistent victim and her parents.
Lindsey's case is just a small example of a widespread problem in American schools: sexual misconduct by the very teachers who are supposed to be nurturing the nation's children.
Students in America's schools are groped. They're raped. They're pursued, seduced and think they're in love.
An Associated Press investigation found more than 2,500 cases over five years in which educators were punished for actions from bizarre to sadistic.
There are three million public school teachers in the U.S., most devoted to their work. Yet the number of abusive educators - nearly three for every school day - speaks to a much larger problem in a system that is stacked against victims.
Most of the abuse never gets reported. Those cases reported often end with no action. Cases investigated sometimes can't be proven, and many abusers have several victims.
And no one - not the schools, not the courts, not the state or federal governments - has found a surefire way to keep molesting teachers out of classrooms.
Those are the findings of an AP investigation in which reporters sought disciplinary records in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The result is an unprecedented national look at the scope of sex offences by educators - the very definition of breach of trust.
The seven-month investigation found 2,570 educators whose teaching credentials were revoked, denied, surrendered or sanctioned from 2001 through 2005 following allegations of sexual misconduct.
Young people were the victims in at least 1,801 of the cases, and more than 80 per cent of those were students. At least half the educators who were punished by their states also were convicted of crimes related to their misconduct.
Beyond the horror of individual crimes, the larger shame is that the institutions that govern education have only sporadically addressed a problem that's been apparent for years.
"From my own experience - this could get me in trouble - I think every single school district in the nation has at least one perpetrator. At least one," says Mary Jo McGrath, a California lawyer who has spent 30 years investigating abuse and misconduct in schools. "It doesn't matter if it's urban or rural or suburban."
One report mandated by Congress estimated that as many as 4.5 million students, out of roughly 50 million in American schools, are subject to sexual misconduct by an employee of a school sometime between kindergarten and 12th grade. That figure includes verbal harassment that's sexual in nature.
Jennah Bramow, one of Lindsey's accusers in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, wonders why there isn't more outrage.
"You're supposed to be able to send your kids to school knowing that they're going to be safe," says Bramow, now 20. While other victims accepted settlement deals and signed confidentiality agreements, she sued her city's schools for failing to protect her and others from Lindsey - and won. Only then was Lindsey's teaching license finally revoked.
Lindsey, now 68, refused multiple requests for an interview.
Actions taken against teachers vary from state to state, but the AP found the number of state actions against sexually abusive teachers rose steadily, to a high of 649 in 2005. More states now require background checks on teachers, fingerprinting and mandatory reporting of abuse, though there are still loopholes and a lack of co-ordination among districts and states.
U.S. Supreme Court rulings in the last 20 years on civil rights and sex discrimination have opened schools up to potentially huge financial punishments for abuses, which has driven some schools to act.
And the U.S. National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification keeps a list of educators who've been punished for any reason, but only shares the names among state agencies. The unco-ordinated system that's developed means some teachers still fall through the cracks and move on to other teaching jobs.
And...
Verbal abuse from teachers linked to risk of early sexual intercourse: study
By Andy Blatchford, THE CANADIAN PRESS
MONTREAL - Children, especially girls, may be more likely to have sex before the age of 14 if they have been verbally abused by teachers, a new study suggests.
The study, which followed 312 children from kindergarten to age 23 in a rural Quebec town, also draws a link between peer rejection and girls engaging in early sexual intercourse.
"The girls seem to suffer more from these negative social experiences," said Mara Brendgen, the study's lead author.
"Girls, generally, are a bit more oriented towards social relationships and suffer more if these social relationships go sour."
Researchers found children at elementary school who were shouted at, harshly criticized or embarrassed by teachers in the classroom had an increased risk of early sexual intercourse.
These students often disengaged from normal expectations and many turned to generalized delinquency, said Brendgen, a psychology professor at the Universite du Quebec in Montreal.
"(Often) it's the same children who are delinquent, who take drugs who also engage in risky sexual behaviour," she said.
Sexually active girls under 14 are more at risk of having multiple partners, which increases their chance of contracting a sexually transmitted disease or becoming pregnant, she added.
The study, published last week in the October issue of the American Journal of Public Health, also suggests that students who were criticized or laughed at by peers developed a lower self esteem.
Brendgen said some girls used sexual intercourse to give their battered self esteem a lift.
"Basically, it's a similar experience that they have from the teachers as they have from peers, in the sense that they are really publicly humiliated and exposed," she said.
Meanwhile, it's the disruptive students who were most frequently targeted, she added.
"It's not random," Brendgen said. "These children have certain behavioural characteristics that may provoke either their peers or the teachers into negative behaviour."
Brendgen estimates between 10 and 15 per cent of children are regularly abused by teachers, while the same percentage are rejected by peers.
Neil Guilding, a co-ordinator at Head and Hands, a Montreal youth-assistance centre, said many adolescents complain about being singled out by their teachers.
"There are definitely situations where certain youths are being picked on all the time," he said.
Guilding believes rejection by teachers and classmates can increase the chance of drug use and criminal activity down the road.
"I think school can be a very lonely and scary place," said Guilding, who runs the centre's drop-in program.
Brendgen, meanwhile, said teacher training should highlight the potential consequences of negative behaviour toward students.
"Teachers need to have a lot more training, but also a lot more support in dealing with problem children," she said.
"On the side of the children, it is also important to maybe think about targeted interventions to help them develop positive relationships with their teachers and with their classmates."
The study, which began assessing children in 1986, was funded by grants from the federal and Quebec governments.
And this...
Mon Oct 22, 3:15 PM
OTTAWA (AFP) - Shorter men are more likely to be sexually attracted to children than their taller peers, according to a new Canadian study of the biological roots of pedophilia.
This is likely the result of exposure to "pre-birth conditions" that affected pedophiles' physical development, the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health reported in "Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment."
"This research does not mean that pedophiles are not criminally responsible for their behavior," said lead researcher James Cantor.
"But the discovery of biological markers for pedophilia has important implications for future study and possibly treatment."
By analyzing the files of over 1,000 men who were assessed for pedophilia or other sexual disorders in Toronto between 1995 and 2006, researchers observed that pedophilic males were two centimeters (0.8 inches) shorter on average than males who were not sexually attracted to children.
This height difference is a trait found in other illnesses with biological links, similar in scope to the shorter height associated with schizophrenia or Alzheimer's disease, the researchers said.
The same scientific team previously found that pedophiles "have lower IQs, are three times more likely to be left-handed, failed school grades significantly more frequently, and suffered more head injuries as children."
