MISSOURI SAFE SCHOOLS

Newsletter of the Missouri Center for Safe Schools

February 2001

FROM THE DIRECTOR . . .

My last official duty as the interim director of the Center for Safe Schools is to inform you that we have completed the interview process for the new director of the Center. Candidates were required to submit a written letter applying for the position, a minimum of three references, and a written statement of their goals and vision for the future leadership of the Center for Safe Schools. There were three phases to the interview portion of the process: an informal interview, a formal interview, and a written paper. I want to thank Kathy Jensen (director of the Kansas City Regional Professional Development Center) and Susan Anderson (field instructor for the Center for Safe Schools) for conducting the informal interviews. I would also like to thank Doug Miller (Coordinator of the Leadership Academy, DESE), Rusty Rosenkoetter (Director of Special State Instructional Programs, DESE), and John Jacobson (Associate Dean, UMKC School of Education), for their involvement in the formal interview process.

We did interview three candidates for this position. The comprehensive process resulted in selection of a highly qualified individual to assume the directorship. The new director is still working out the final details with the University of Missouri-Kansas City and will be officially announced in the near future. The new director will come on board with the Center starting June 1, 2001. Until then, the new director will have 20 days of consultant time with the Center to ease the transition.

Dr. Russell Thompson has been promoted to Associate Director for the Center for Safe Schools and his leadership will be a major factor in the success of the Center in the days and months to come. Since the director has been selected and the transition plans are operational, I will move back to my former role as president of the Advisory Board for the Center for Safe Schools. I have appreciated the opportunity to serve in the interim role and cannot thank enough Dr. Russ Thompson, Susan Anderson, and Mike Boothe for all their support and leadership throughout my service in that position.

One final "heads up." The Center for Safe Schools is beginning the process of putting together a Safe Schools Symposium at the Lenoir Center in Columbia on September 11, 2001. Mark your calendar. More details will follow in the next newsletter.

Jerry Cooper

 

FROM RUSTY . . .

Safe Schools grant applications are out in schools and also available on line at www.dese.state.mo.us/divinstr/SSIP. There is a workshop on grant preparation scheduled for April 4, 1:00 p.m., at Thomas Jefferson Middle School in Jefferson City.

Rusty Rosenkoetter, Director, Special State Instructional Programs, DESE

 

SEXUAL HARASSMENT IN OUR SCHOOLS

According to one American Institute of University Women study, 70% of girls experience harassment and 50% experience unwanted touching in their schools. The Safe Schools Anti-Violence Project reported that 34% of Washington state homosexual students had been harassed because of their sexual orientation. The homosexual students were 75% more likely to report feeling unsafe at school than heterosexual students. Among the Washington schools surveyed, 75% of students who were harassed because of their perceived sexual orientation were actually heterosexual.

The U.S. Supreme Court held in Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education that school districts may be liable for damages under Title IX in cases of peer sexual harassment if the district was deliberately indifferent to sexual harassment of which it had actual knowledge and the harassment was "so severe, pervasive and objectively offensive" that it somehow deprived the victim of access to educational opportunities or benefits. Lower courts have since applied the Davis test to peer sexual harassment cases leading to a recent jury verdict of $200,000 for a Kentucky girl who was sexually harassed by fellow students.

Although the Davis case involved the harassment of a female student by a male student, lower courts have also recognized a cause of action for the harassment of gay students under Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause. In 1996, Jamie Nabozy sued his Wisconsin school district and school officials alleging that they had violated his equal protection rights by failing to take action against fellow students who continually harassed and physically abused him throughout his middle school and high school years. The appeals court held that the district had violated the student’s equal protection rights by discriminating against him on the basis of gender or sexual orientation. The case was ultimately settled for $900,000. In 2000, a Minnesota student who was harassed from Kindergarten through 10th grade by fellow students because of his perceived sexual orientation was allowed to bring a cause of action against his school district under Title IX, the Equal Protection Clause, and the Minnesota Human Rights statute.

School districts also face liability for teacher sexual harassment of students and for sexual harassment of school employees by their supervisors or fellow employees. The Missouri Center for Safe Schools provides inservices on sexual harassment. Please contact Susan Anderson (andersonsa@umkc.edu) if you would like to schedule training for your district.

 

BOMB THREATS

Here are some ideas for dealing with bomb threats:

What People in the Community Should Know:
  1. All threats are taken seriously.
  2. Bomb threats are considered terroristic threats, a class C felony in Missouri.
  3. The school district has in place procedures including: bomb threat checklists for individuals receiving a telephoned threat, notification procedures, search procedures, procedures for safely evacuating the buildings as appropriate, and procedures for securing the crime scene.
  4. Bomb threats to schools are a significant problem throughout the United States. More than 90% of bomb threats are pranks.
  5. Large-scale bomb incidents (Oklahoma City, the World Trade Center, etc.) occurred without warning.

When To Evacuate/Close School:
  1. There is no black and white line for determining when to evacuate the school.
  2. When students see an immediate evacuation each time a bomb threat is received they quickly learn that the best way out of class is to call in a bomb threat.
  3. All bomb threats must be taken seriously and carefully analyzed. Factors to consider include: Have there been national bomb incidents lately? Have there been other hoaxes lately? Has a hostile student been suspended recently? Are there exams scheduled for today? Has there been any unexplained student unrest?

Administrators Have Alternatives:
  1. Conduct a low profile search of the exterior grounds and public areas of the building.
  2. Conduct a comprehensive search, having all staff search their work area, in addition to the grounds and public areas.
  3. Search with partial evacuation.
  4. Evacuate after searching.
  5. Evacuate immediately after clearing egress routes and the assembly areas.

For more information on this topic, see the monograph entitled "Bomb Threats" on the web page of the Missouri Center for Safe Schools.

 

FIGHTS

The Missouri Safe Schools Act (RSMo 160.261) calls for districts to provide inservice to all teachers on the approved methods for dealing with acts of school violence. The most common act of school violence is the fight. Here are some tips for dealing quickly and effectively with fights:

  1. Verbal Intervention. In a calm but firm voice, verbally intervene by identifying yourself and directing the students to stop fighting. Use the students’ names, if you know them. Do not invade the personal space of the combatants. Direct each of them to move to a specific location in order to separate them. If the students stop fighting and separate themselves, escort them to the office. Never send fighting students to the office without an adult escort.
  2. Send For Help. If the combatants do not follow your directions and continue to fight, send a responsible student on-looker for help in accordance with the school plan. Direct the other students to move out of the area. Assess the situation while continuing to calmly talk to the fighting students and while moving any dangerous objects out of their way (items that they could bump their heads on or which could be used as weapons). If this is a situation in which one student is on the attack and the other student seems to be acting in self-defense, focus your remarks on the attacking student. If the attacking student lets up, direct the defending student to go to the office by himself and keep the attacking student with you.
  3. Physical Intervention as Necessary. When the intervention team arrives, provide them the names of the students and report to them on how the students have responded to your direction. The team leader will take over. It takes a minimum of four, and desirably six adults (three per combatant) to safely separate two secondary level fighting students and physically restrain them until they regain self-control or until law enforcement arrives.

For more information on this topic, see the monograph entitled "A Guide For Intervening in Fights" on the web page of the Missouri Center for Safe Schools.

 

SAFETY COORDINATOR TRAINING

The year 2000 changes to the Missouri Safe Schools Act included a requirement that each district's safety coordinator have a thorough knowledge of all federal, state, and local school violence prevention programs and resources. DESE will be monitoring this requirement as part of the MSIP facilities and safety standards.

The Missouri Center for Safe Schools, in collaboration with the Regional Professional Development Centers, is conducting a 3-hour training for district safety coordinators. The workshops are currently scheduled as follows:

  • SW MO RPDC (Joplin), January 31
  • SE MO RPDC (Scott County R-IV), February 8
  • Kansas City RPDC (Hickman Mills) February 13
  • Rolla RPDC (Rolla), February 21
  • Warrensburg RPDC (Clinton), March 1
  • NE MO RPDC (Pike County R-III), March 8
  • NW MO RPDC (St. Joseph), March 14
  • St. Louis RPDC (Riverview Gardens), March 30
  • Columbia RPDC (Cairo), April 4
  • SW MO RPDC (Springfield), April 18

Other locations will be scheduled. For more information or registration, contact your Regional Professional Development Centers.

Check out the web page for the Missouri Center for Safe Schools at http://www.umkc.edu/safe-school and call us at our offices in the School of Education, University of Missouri-Kansas City, (816) 235-5656.