Bill demonizing teachers awaits Governor Nixon's signature

Judging from what he said a few days ago, Gov. Jay Nixon will deliver a slap in the face to Missouri teachers some time this week.

The deadline for signing or vetoing bills is Wednesday and the governor indicated he will sign Senate Bill 54, the so-called Amy Hestir Student Protection Act, though it is obvious he is giving the signing careful consideration since the final decision has been delayed until the deadline.

This is the bill that leaves the impression, an impression Sen. Cunningham has cultivated, that all teachers are perverts and that impressionable children must be protected from them.

Probably the only thing that has kept the governor from signing the bill has been the May 22 Joplin Tornado. As the media pointed out, the Joplin School District was able to locate many of its students through the use of Facebook. This would not have been possible had Sen. Cunningham's bill already been law since it prohibits teachers and students from communicating through social networking sites.

The answer that Sen. Cunningham has for that is that another way can be found, and that there is nothing wrong with the law. Gov. Nixon, too, has indicated this is not an insurmountable problem.

The problem is the law itself. Sadly, the media, as might be expected, limited its examination of the issue to the tornado and did not even look into other aspects of teachers communicating with students through Facebook, or for that matter, other problems with the law itself.

There is no need for the Amy Hestir Student Protection Act. Mrs. Cunningham has exploited this poor woman, bringing her before House and Senate committees for the past few years, having her tell her story over and over. The sexual abuse that Amy Hestir went through was horrific. And the fact that the teacher who did this to her was able to move from one school district to another, what is referred to as "passing the trash" is inexcusable.

This act, however, is not the answer to the problem. The laws are already in place, something Sen. Cunningham never mentions. During the mid 1990s, the state enacted laws which toughened background checks on teachers, expedited the removal of criminal teachers from the classroom, and ensured that their teaching licenses would be revoked.

And those laws have worked. Ironically, the success of that legislation has been used as a weapon against teachers by Sen. Cunningham. Each year as she pushed this legislation, she cited an Associated Press survey which showed Missouri ranked high in the number of teachers whose licenses were revoked for sexual acts with students.

In other words, these people were already being removed from having contact with students and their licenses were being revoked. The law was working. The very success of the law served as ammunition for Sen. Cunningham, since the AP study was comparing Missouri to states that have taken no action to cut down on the minority of teachers who bring shame to the whole profession.

If the biggest problem is the "passing the trash" syndrome, and Sen. Cunningham indicated many times that it was, then all that was needed was specific sanctions against administrators and perhaps school boards that allow this to happen.

That was not enough for Sen. Cunningham, however. School districts will now have to spend a considerable amount of time reworking their policies to reflect her view that all teachers are hunters chasing underage prey around the school building.

And the hundreds of teachers across the state who have effectively used Facebook and other social networking sites to communicate with students, and I am one of those, will have to trash years worth of work, because all teachers are potential criminals in Sen. Cunningham's view.

The teachers I know who communicate with students through Facebook have a large number of parents as "friends" and most of the communication with students is done on the Facebook wall.

There are times, however, when students feel uncomfortable putting their thoughts in front of the whole world. As an example, I will mention a fourth quarter project I do with my eighth graders each year in which they learn how to properly fill out job applications, construct resumes, learn tips on job interviews, and go through mock interviews. Each year, I receive at least a dozen Facebook messages from high school students who are about to go through their first real job interview, looking for tips and wanting ways to make their resumes more effective. These are not things they are going to be willing to put on the wall for all to see. Under Sen. Cunningham's law, I will not be able to have these former students as Facebook friends until they have graduated from high school.

Can they contact me through other means? Sure. Will they? Experience indicates to me they will not. Facebook is their preferred means of communication at this point at least.

The ready answer some provide is to establish a school-friendly network that students can use. You can set it up, and yes, a few students will use it, but most will not. We have all seen it tried before.

After I wrote a few weeks ago about the Joplin tornado situation, I was immediately contacted by several businesses wanting to sell me school-friendly social networking sites. You can sell the adults on these; students will avoid them like the plague.

As far as I know, not one teacher who used social networking constructively has ever been called before one of Sen. Cunningham's hearings to testify on that portion of the bill.

The worst part about all of this is this bill would not have passed had the Missouri NEA and the Missouri State Teachers Association opposed it, as both organizations have in the past.

Both organizations supported the bill with NEA noting that it provided more due process for educators charged with wrongdoing.

What about due process for educators interested in educating? Doesn't that matter to the groups that are supposed to be looking out for our interests in Jefferson City?

All teachers who use Facebook to communicate with students are being penalized though there has not been any evidence presented that any of them have abused the privilege.

What will be next?

Legislators such as Sen. Cunningham have found the past few years that they have a good chance of passing laws that target three types of individuals- drunk drivers, sex offenders, and classroom teachers.

If. Gov. Nixon signs SB 54 this week, it will continue the degrading of our profession and the only effect it will have is on teachers who have always followed the law and who would never dream of violating the sacred trust we have to teach children. We will eliminate students and former students from our Facebook lists.

For some students, that move could very well prevent them from confiding in a trusted adult friend who might be able to help them get through serious problems in their lives. For Joplin students, that could be dealing with the aftermath of losing their homes and having their lives uprooted on May 22. For others, it may be confiding in just the kind of horrific crime that the Amy Hestir Student Protection Act is supposedly designed to eliminate.

Because of this short-sighted bill, the next time students find themselves with problems they need to talk over with a trusted adult, there may be no one legally able to listen.