x-post from TAO: Young sex offenders

[Greaseball]

My dh started his student teaching, and was just warned that a new student of his was a sex offender. It's the school's policy to warn all teachers if one joins their class. But they don't warn the students or the parents!

I find this disturbing. Wouldn't you want to know if your child was in a class with a convicted sex offender? Shouldn't the child have a right to know? We have no problem putting up flyers that tell adults where these people live, so they can choose not to live there, but we can't do the same for children?

I don't have confidence in a school's ability to provide constant supervision. There just aren't enough teachers to watch over someone. And still, would you leave your child with a convicted sex offender as long as he had a "supervisor?" I wouldn't!

I just started reading Protecting the Gift and the author says a lot of schools don't even have policies for how to handle child-on-child sexual abuse. There was one story about a 10-year-old who was raping younger students in the bathroom. The school knew about his problem but never warned anyone. They provided a supervisor for trips to the bathroom; unfortunately that supervisor was another student! And not even an older, bigger student!

Dh says it's weird knowing this about one of his students. He never considered the right of parents and students to know about issues that may affect student safety, though. I wish something could be done about this. I'm not even supposed to know.

Just one more reason to keep my kids out of ps...although I guess this could happen in a private school too. But I will be sure to interview the administrators and find out how they deal with this. I want to be informed, and if they can't inform me of something like that, it's not the right school for us.

[LoveBeads]

Thank you for posting this. It's something that I had never thought about but I'm glad to know about it because I plan to quiz my DD's school admins about it.

[CookieMonsterMommy]

They Can't

If they (the offenders) a're juveniles, they (the school/authorities) can't tell you about the record.

I know, it sucks, but it's the law.

--Kelly

[Greaseball]

I would think they could say something like "A student in your child's class has been convicted of a sexual offense. We will give your child the opportunity to transfer to another class, if you and she desire." That way they could protect the offender's anonymity, and keep students safe and parents aware.

Of course, I think the ideal solution would be to remove the offending student from the school and let him be educated through correspondence and home tutoring. Some districts provide this for chronically ill students.

[CerridwenLorelei]

is there a way to find out what it was

because along with the real offenders there are teens out there now carrying the label for having consensual sex with their girlfriend/boyfriend who were not of legal age yet
or if it is true offender -something just seems fishy in denmark

[Greaseball]

I think at my dh's school, it was a "true" offender, because he was recently released from an inpatient offender program. It's true that sometimes they are lumped together without regard for the types of offenses, but statutory rape usually doesn't require any kind of treatment.

I think if his record was one of sexually attacking other teens, it would be irresponsible to have him in a public school. It could be he has never hurt a teenager and was mainly molesting other much younger children...not exactly a comfort, though.

I don't know how much school officials are told about these kind of students. I know on those alerts for neighborhoods, they list the types of offenses and victims.

[Artisan]

In the state I teach in, even TEACHERS aren't allowed to know if they have sex offenders/felons/violent students in their classes. It all has to do with state juvenile confidentiality laws. I do think it's wrong, and once you are convicted of a felony, you should lose your right to be educated in a traditional public school setting.

Offering people an opportunity to leave the class if there's a sex offender present wouldn't work... who WOULDN'T transfer? You'd be left with only the sex offender. I think they just need to be kept out of public schools altogether.

[Greaseball]

I agree with keeping them out of schools. I don't think they are particularly choosy about their victims - I think if their chosen kind of victim is not available, they will be happy to victimize someone else.

They would never let a known sex offender be a teacher. It doesn't make sense to let them be students either. Students can hurt other students just as much as adults can. Offending students may be even better at gaining the trust of students they will later victimize.

They are allowed into colleges, but their pictures are posted so staff and students know who they are.

[octobersweethearts]

I don't know a whole lot about this, but one of my girlfriends used to be a victim's advocate for child-on-child sexual assault. It is really sad because a large percentage of the children who act out sexually or molest other children have been molested themselves.

I believe child sex offenders are allowed to attend school here, but I know they passed a law several years ago that the offender had to be moved to a different school than the child he/she assaulted.

I couldn't believe this wasn't already happening...can you imagine being sexually assaulted by a kid and then have to see that person every day at school??

[Greaseball]

With all the worrying about lawsuits, I'm surprised a school would want this risk. I read in another thread about parents needing to provide permission slips for their child to bring breath mints to school! (I guess some students disguise drugs as mints.) If the school is that worried about being sued, I think having a convicted criminal in the classroom would worry them more than the breath mints.

We were never told about child-on-child sexual abuse in school. In the sex ed classes, we learned that sexual abuse was something that was done usually by your stepfather, uncle or babysitter.

[EFmom]

I'm positive no school wants this. They don't really have a choice.

[Raven]

Thats scary!