Wednesday, May 18, 2005

With friends like this...

Showing a video is molestation.

This Davidson County teacher 'befriended' children with self-esteem issues and now, it appears, he's only compounded their problems. God help them. My heart is too full of grief for these children, anger at the adults in their lives that missed this, questions wondering how this can be stopped to think or write very clearly.

I know the number of teachers who take advantage of children is small, but it seems that not a month goes by without another one popping up. It's almost not news anymore. We've got to do better at preventing these sorts of people from having that position of authority in the lives of our children. Is it any wonder that good parents are becoming more and more uncomfortable with leaving their children with a system that regularly has to deal with this issue? How can we continue to compel people to enroll their children when incidents like this occur?

Our schools may have gotten too big. Too many strangers lumped together. Too many parents too disconnected from their children. Our natural societal accountability has broken down.

What should have and will be done to prevent this from happening again? For now, the teacher is on unpaid administrative leave. For now these children have a long road of healing ahead of them.

No comments: