A middle school art teacher says she discussed her sexual preference with her middle school students, after they asked about it. After the discussion, she had the students draw pictures of their own sexual preferences. She was fired shortly thereafter.
There was a time, not that long ago, that a student would never have imagined asking a teacher about their sexual preferences. There were boundaries back then, and they were rarely crossed.
And, had a rare student crossed that boundary, and asked a teacher about their sexual preferences, the teacher would have sent the student straight back to their seat or to the office. The teacher certainly would not have held a class discussion on the subject.
It’s not clear when the lines got blurred, but it’s gotten pretty creepy. Maybe it began about the time when kids stopped calling adults Mr. or Mrs. So-and-So. Things started getting more casual.
In any event, Cape Coral art instructor Casey Scott, at the time a teacher at Trafalgar Middle School, thought it would be appropriate to explain to her middle school students that she is “pansexual.” She explained further that that means she is attracted to all types of people regardless of their sex, gender identity or sexual orientation, although she is married to a man. After the discussion, she thought it would be a good plan to have her students draw pictures representing their own sexual preferences.
Some of you who remember the good old days are probably shaking your heads right now. Not Mrs. Scott though. No, she took those drawings and hung them right on her classroom door. She must have been very proud of them.
Not surprisingly, administrators told her to take the drawings down and get rid of them, which she did. But, after some of the students went home and told their parents what happened at school that day, some of them were understandably upset. Soon after, Mrs. Scott’s contract was terminated.
What has happened to boundaries between a teacher and his/her students? Or between adults and kids in general for that matter? Should we go back to the good old days?
