Allegations
of Sexual Abuse |
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Few items of news have
been sadder than the plight of His case illustrates
the tragedy of a profession that desperately needs more men yet has to treat
them with suspicion. The invidious position of male teachers in primary
schools these days was well-described by educationist Alison Jones in the
Herald yesterday. Their union, the New
Zealand Educational Institute, advises them for their own legal safety to be
visible at all times they might be alone with children. They should ensure
doors have glass panels or are left open and even install mirrors in the
classroom if necessary to ensure they are always in others’ line of sight. They are advised to
avoid touching a child in any way. Male teachers are wary now about
permitting a child to run to them and take their hand, and must be careful
even about giving a comforting hug to a child who is upset. Those normal and
harmless dimensions of interacting with children are now safely available
only to female teachers. Every male in the profession is treated with
suspicion and the care they must take to be visible and non-physical at all
times tells them constantly that they are not trusted. Who would want to work
under that sort of suspicion and surveillance? In the circumstances it is a
wonder the primary service recruits any men at all. The climate of
suspicion can only increase the risk of unwarranted accusations. As Alison
Jones explained, the need for a constant witness is a highly unpredictable
precaution. The "process of invigilation" means observers are
encouraged to treat male teachers as potential abusers who might offend
unless they are watched. And to keep an eye on someone for that purpose
increases the risk that innocent behaviour will be misinterpreted. In
addition, she said, children who sense that male teachers are anxious about
touch "learn they have a lot of power in speaking about touch. It is,
they sense, a weapon against adults, whose potency they do not always
understand". If all of this makes
primary schools a dangerous place for men, so be it, say those who
investigate and prosecute suspected child abuse. They will say, quite
rightly, that the protection of children is more important than making
primary teaching more attractive to men and more important even than the risk
that the occasional teacher might be unfairly accused. But extreme vigilance
is contributing to a larger problem. Of more than 25,000 teachers in About a third of the
children in those schools will have no adult male in their home either. Many
children nowadays are growing up entirely under female care and tutelage and
it being suggested that, for boys anyway, this is a problem. It is one theory
offered to explain the poor relative performance of boys in secondary school
these days. Be that as it may, it
is undisputed that children benefit from healthy interaction with both men
and women. There must be a way for education to keep paedophiles out of the schoolgrounds without regarding every male teacher as a
potential criminal. This extreme vigilance is doing no good for the
profession or the pupils. |