Until my retirement in 2018, I taught in Sweetwater District for 31 years, the last 16 of them at Sweetwater High School. I have read with great interest the stories from across the nation about people who would require teachers to inform parents that which is told to teachers in confidence.
Those whose theology is entirely contained with the claim that “God Hates Fags” miss out on some extremely important aspects of the argument. Those who want to turn the country over to the 2% of Americans who are ultra-right wing, MAGA-hatted, Trump-worshipping Christians-in-Name-Only need to consider this:
When a student confides to a teacher that they are gay or trans or questioning their sexual status, the first thing the majority of teachers will ask is, “Have you discussed this with your parents?” In my experience, the answer was usually yes. I have a hunch that is the case more often than not, but sometimes the student will confide that they are afraid that the parental response will be negative or even violent.
Some people would suggest that immediately after that conversation, the teacher should call the parent and tell him/her about it. But the teacher is a mandated reporter, so immediately after calling the parent, the teacher would be required to call Child Protective Services to report the day’s conversations on the topic.
Thus the teacher would have listened to the student, betrayed their trust by contacting the person that the child has identified as punitive or even violent, and then reported the entire episode to CPS.
And incidentally, no student would ever confide that or anything else to that teacher or any other, because they will have been shown that teachers could not be trusted.
My relationships with my students were sacrosanct (and, in many cases, still are). In that respect, I am not unusual among teachers.
If you are someone who would follow a different path, I don’t know what you are, but you are not a teacher and you are not a decent human being. My colleagues and I would be happy to demonstrate our command of imprecative vocabulary and, if necessary, meet you at the top of the stairs for a lesson in gravity. Save us all the trouble and find jobs miles from the nearest school.
Ben Cassel resides in Yucca Valley.
