![]() But scholars say bullied students and their parents have increasingly turned to the courts to seek redress for alleged failures by school officials to stop or adequately respond to problem behavior. It is too early for any civil claims for liability in Benedict’s case. Researchers find a rise in lawsuits, and settlements It includes sexual orientation and gender identity in its anti-bullying law, but has also adopted a law restricting discussions of LGBTQ issues in schools. On the flip side, 24 states include sexual orientation and gender identity in their anti-bullying laws or rules as of 2021, according to Child Trends, a Rockville, Md.-based research organization.Īt least one state, Iowa, would appear to fall in both categories. Other states have passed similar laws, as well as some barring transgender females from participating in girls’ athletics or more generally restricting discussions of sexual orientation or gender identity in the curriculum. ![]() In the letter, Robinson refers to Oklahoma as being among the “nation’s top five promulgators of anti-LGBTQ+, discrimination,” citing its adoption of laws that prohibit gender-affirming health care for transgender youths and barring transgender students from using names, pronouns, and restrooms consistent with their gender identity. 21 letter from HRC President Kelley Robinson. ![]() “We are deeply concerned about the failure of Owasso High School to address documented instances of bullying, violence, and harassment against Nex, which occurred in earnest over the course of the previous school year,” said the Feb. Cardona calling on the department to investigate Owasso High’s alleged failure to address harassment and discrimination against Benedict. The federal action came after the Human Rights Campaign, a Washington-based LGBTQ+ civil rights organization, wrote on Feb. Department of Education’s office for civil rights launched its own probe into the incident. But the investigation is continuing, and last week the U.S. The police had said preliminary autopsy results indicated that Benedict did not die as a result of trauma. “I didn’t really see the point in it,” Benedict told the officer.īenedict died the next day, and there is uncertainty surrounding the student’s cause of death. In an interview captured on a school resource officer’s body camera, Benedict said they had not contacted a school counselor or administrator about earlier bullying activity by the girls involved in the restroom incident. The girls allegedly beat Benedict in the restroom, and Benedict hit their head on the floor.įrom a hospital bed, the student provided police with their account of the altercation. 7 altercation in a school restroom with three girls who had allegedly mocked Benedict in the past over their appearance. The Oklahoma case involves Nex Benedict, a nonbinary 10th grader at Owasso High School in a Tulsa suburb who died one day after a Feb. “In order to make schools change their climate to be safe for all students, including the scores of students bullied on the basis of their sexual orientation, schools must be made afraid of what will happen to them if they don’t.” Questions about what occurred in a high school restroom “There is still much work to be done” to make schools safer for bullied students, Christine Tamer, an assistant law professor at the University of North Texas at Dallas, observed in a recent scholarly article. “Attitudes have shifted on students with disabilities and students with gender identity issues.”īut that doesn’t mean bullying has been erased from the nation’s schools, of course. “Everybody’s awareness of it as a problem is far more heightened than it was 15 to 20 years ago,” said Holben, an associate professor of secondary education at East Stroudsburg University. Holben, a former school district administrator in Pennsylvania who is now an education professor who has studied bullying and the legal liability surrounding it, said there has been a notable change in outlook among educators over the last generation toward bullying and harassment of students by their peers. They generally raise every defense they possibly can to avoid accountability.”ĭiane M. Far too often, schools are not doing what the law or their own anti-bullying policies require. “Bullying needs to be treated as the serious problem it is, not as a normal rite of passage to be left alone and endured. Kimmel, the director of the Students’ Civil Rights Project at Public Justice, a Washington, D.C., and Oakland, Calif., legal organization that has made anti-bullying a major part of its work. “Bullying is devastating our children,” said Adele P. Constitution face a relatively high bar for plaintiffs to hold school authorities liable.ĭespite all that, there has been an apparent increase in legal settlements over harassment and bullying cases in recent years, some with payouts in the millions of dollars. Meanwhile, claims under federal law and the U.S.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |