Do parents have a right to be informed about their kids?
Rape should stay a secret, says school
On March 6, a twenty-two year old man raped a fourteen year-old learning disabled student. Another man held her down during the assault. She was told that it was her fault she was raped and that if she told anybody about it she would be hurt. She ended up with a sexually transmitted disease and finally told about the rape when being treated for that infection.
Her mother and grandparents, who are the girl’s guardians, were not told of the assault until they withdrew her from the school in May.
The mother removed the girl because she thought it was behind the mood swings she had suffered in the previous two months.
“She was very withdrawn and running away. She wasn’t the same girl.”
As the mother was getting the leaving form signed off, she was approached by the counselor, who referred her to a doctor, from whom she learned of the rape.
The Auckland health board has a policy for informing parents when their children are raped. For kids under fourteen the parent will be told about it. For kids over sixteen the parents won’t be told about it without the child’s permission. For the ones who are between fourteen and sixteen they will “balance the child’s right to privacy with that of emotional and physical safety”. In this case they decided that this particular fourteen year-old child with a learning disability was mentally mature enough to handle the aftermath of being raped without her family’s knowledge or assistance.
As Dr Patrick Kelly, clinical director of the abuse assessment unit says, “There is no automatic requirement that a young person’s parent or guardian has a right of access to information about that young person.”
(Tip credit to Texas Teacher)
Makes one glad to live in the USA! This is even more stupid than the usual stuff schools do that we read here! I hope the two guys were arrested…..
barry
There have been instances in this country where girls have been taken to abortionists by public school officials who definitely do not inform the parents.
There are schools that give students surveys asking them about how they feel about drugs, sex, and rock and roll without making the survey conveniently available to parents beforehand and just assuming that parents who have not seen the survey have given “passive” consent. We now have a new law in my state prohibiting “passive” consent because of one such incident. Students were actually told that they had to participate. (I don’t know what’s wrong with kids today, because in my day, a guidance counselor tried that on us, and we basically told her that our parents (the TAXPAYERS) would be very upset about how their money was being spent, and we weren’t going to participate, but that’s another story.)
There are many ways public schools today usurp parental authority. When they take the slide down that slippery slope, parents lose trust in the system. Parents who are upset enough about it remove their children if they have the wherewithal to do so.
What A sick, sick place school has become. I am almost looking forward to the end of public schools and to the rise of charter schools. I think the policies would be a lot better thought if a buisness or sponser could be held liable the mistakes that public schools are making on a regular basis.
I hope this child gets some decent help. What a cruel philosophy. “she caused it on herself”, where was the safety and protection at this school? Out to lunch.