…another reason to homeschool!
I joined the homeschooling bandwagon a lot earlier than many. I wasn’t a true pioneer like my cousin Lois was, but she inspired me to homeschool Enric soon after.
The reasons to do so were many. Too many to list here, but as the years pass, I feel more vallidated in my decision. Like recent headlines about way too many sex scandals involving teachers and their students.
I remember in my junior high school there were whispers of one English teacher and another young girl. If that was later proved to be true, I never learned about it.
Some years later, however, there arose yet another scandal in my old high school, and incidently right across the street where I was living at the time. Living there became a nightmare as all the news channels camped out in front of our homes and near the school in hopes to get the students to say something on their news. This scandal went all the way to Donahue, and several of the local kids appeared on his show. This was a hot topic apparently.
These news stories go more than to just inappropriate touching, or a one time mistake, these teachers are having long time relationships with the students. Today on the news they said that this kind of scandal is starting to get worse than those of the clergy in the Catholic church. Whoa! Not to mention, that many instances go grossly unreported, and more than one news story felt that boys would be less likely to report to an authority having sex with a female teacher.
A few case studies:
In 2002, a California high school teacher ran off to Las Vegas with one of her 15-year-old students;
The same year, a Louisiana teacher was accused of having an affair with a 14-year-old student;
In the Bronx, one teacher was charged with the statutory rape of a 16-year-old former student;
In March, a 20-year-old Anderson, Ind. choir aide was charged with allegedly raping a 16-year-old female student—the two had a consensual relationship for three months before the girl asked to break it off;
A week earlier, an Indianapolis Public Schools substitute was caught having sex with a 15-year-old student in a vacant classroom;
A Washington state teacher was convicted of 10 counts of sexually exploiting minors by persuading them to pose nude for him—he then uploaded some of the images to a Web site;
Also in Washington, state officials say 159 coaches of girls sports have been fired or reprimanded over the last decade for sexual misconduct;
An investigation found more than 60 instances in the last four years of Texas high school and middle school coaches losing jobs as a result of allegations of sexual misconduct.
Very disturbing.
Related News Stories
Teacher Sex Insanity Plea Planned
Wrong chemistry lesson
Student Teacher Sexual Relations
Sex Scandal Rocks Catholic High
Fifth School Sex Scandal In A Month
Sex Abuse by Teachers Said Worse Than Catholic Church
Two more teachers held in sex scandal
Teacher-student sex scandals reveal something wrong with schools
Qns. teach quits in new sex scandal
I’d say there was more than enough here to really warrant ACTION. Admittedly, some are being prosecuted. Sadly, government will likely throw money at it, tax us so they can “study” it.













Wow… I actually read alot of those links Barb. Sounds alarming! Here is
what I often wonder though. Is this a growing problem as of late or has it
pretty much always been going on and because of the world of instant communication
we are in today… we have access to it. Back in the old days, all we had
was the TV news and the Papers… I am beginning to think they only reported
on what THEY felt we needed to know.
I was homeschooled for three years (5th – 7th grades) and don’t regret it at all. Of course it wasn’t really my *choice* but I had no real problem with it. It didn’t actually have to do with scandals like you mentioned, more of the fact that the school system is generally incompetent and tends to cater to the bottom of the barrel in class. If there’s a student or two that just don’t get it, no matter how simple the concept, the whole class gets held back waiting for those students to catch up. This means the brighter students get bored and that leads to a whole host of other problems. Homeschooling is a great alternative, but only if you can afford to take the time and put in the effort that it requires. Good luck!