Maintaining Professional Adult/Student Boundaries Training

1. ExCEL Program Managers & Site Coordinators Training August 29, 2019 Maintaining Professional Adult/Student Boundaries

2. Connector- Who’s in the Room? Please share your: • Name • Organization • Favorite part of the summer

3. Introduction Christine Lee, Senior Deputy General Counsel Greg John, Executive Director of Talent Management

4. Today’s Outcomes By the end of the session, participants will: • Know Frame & Scope of the Problem • Recognize boundary violations when you see them or when they are reported to you. • Understand how to report and interrupt boundary violations before they result in abuse.

5. TABLE ACTIVITY • Review and discuss the facts that have been reported to you • Choose your response: • Very Concerned – File a CPS Report • More Concerned – Report Concern to Principal • Somewhat Concerned - Check in/talk to the staff member • No Concern – Do Nothing

6. What are professional Boundaries? Professional boundaries are the parameters that describe the limits of a relationship where one person entrusts their welfare and safety to a professional and often in circumstances where a power imbalance might exist.

7. Professional Adult/Student Boundaries - Cont’d • We have a collective commitment, responsibility, and duty to protect students and provide a safe and secure learning environment. • Maintaining professional boundaries with students helps us meet this commitment. • Knowledge of professional boundaries helps recognize potential violations and increases our ability to prevent more serious violations. • Violation of boundaries when it serves no legitimate educational purpose. • “Legitimate Educational Purposes:” related to teaching, counseling, athletics, extracurricular activities, treatment of a student's physical injury or other medical needs, school administration, or other purposes within the scope of the adult’s employment duties.

8. Scope of the Sexual Abuse Problem - National Statistics • 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys • 7% of school age youth • Estimate 80% of abuse goes unreported

9. Table Activity - Test Your Knowledge

10. Scope of the Problem - SFUSD

11. Who Offenders Are & How They Operate

12. Types of Offenders San Francisco Unified School District

13. Understanding How Offenders Operate ✓Access ✓Privacy ✓Control Control is accomplished through calculated and increasingly serious boundary violations.

14. Putting the Puzzle Together………..

15. Board Policy 4019.1

16. Physical Affection With Students – Dos • Patting student on head, back or shoulder • Side hugs • Fist bumps and high fives’ • Holding hands while walking young children

17. Physical Affection With Students – Don’ts • Any form of unwanted affection • Hands in students’ pockets • Full frontal hugs • Laying down or sleeping beside youths • Letting students cling to the legs • Holding students on the lap • Massages given by students or adults • Patting students on the bottom or the thigh • Tickling or wrestling • Kissing

18. BP 4019.1 - Addresses 4 Main Areas: • Conduct that has the appearance of impropriety (i.e. being alone with a student) • Electronic Communications • Boundary Violations • Boundary Violations Constituting Serious Misconduct

19. Avoid Conduct that has the Appearance of Impropriety Be aware of the appearance of impropriety in your own conduct and the conduct of other adults when interacting with students. Even though your intent may be professional and there is a legitimate educational purpose for the conduct, the following activities can create the appearance of impropriety: • Being alone with an individual student out of view of others; • Inviting or allowing individual students to visit your home; • Remaining on campus with student(s) after the last administrator leaves the school site; • Visiting a student’s home unless home visits are a required and expected duty. Whenever possible, avoid these situations. If unavoidable, these activities should be pre-approved by the appropriate administrator. If not pre-approved, report the occurrence to the appropriate administrator as soon as possible.

20. Electronic Communications - Blurry • Only for legitimate educational purposes. • Include the parent/guardian and/or school principal.  • Use District email and District communication devices  • Never use snapchat or other apps designed to eliminate all traces or records of the communication • Send athletic team or club messages in a single communication to all participating team or club members; except for communications concerning an individual student's medical or academic privacy matters, in which case the communications will be copied to the school principal. • Do not follow or accept requests from current students or non-adult (under 21) former students to be friends on personal social networking sites 

21. Boundary Violations A boundary violation is conduct that does not have a legitimate educational purpose and has the potential to abuse the adult/student relationship. For example: • Being alone with a student without a legitimate educational purpose. • Singling out a particular student or students for personal attention and friendship beyond the professional staff-student relationship (such as by exchanging personal gifts or cards). • Maintaining personal contact with a student outside of school by phone, e-mail, instant messenger or Internet chat rooms, social networking websites, such as Facebook, or letters beyond homework or other legitimate school business without including the parent/guardian.

22. Boundary Violations - Continued • “Friending” or “following” students on social media unless the social media page is dedicated to legitimate school business, including the posting of student images or other personally identifiable information of students on an adult’s personal website. • Addressing students or permitting students to address staff members with personalized terms of endearment, pet names or otherwise in an overly familiar manner. • For non-guidance/counseling staff, encouraging students to confide their personal or family problems and/or relationships.

23. Boundary Violations - Continued • Touching students or initiating inappropriate physical contact without a legitimate educational purpose, i.e., initiating hugs. Note: Legitimate purposes could include the following: (a) assisting an injured student; (b) assisting a student with special needs who requires assistance with toileting or other physical assistance; (c) appropriate coaching instruction; (d) appropriate music instruction; or (e) to protect the safety of students or staff. • Socializing or spending time with students outside of school-sponsored events. • Transporting student(s) in a personal vehicle in a non-emergency situation and without proper written authorization forms in advance.

24. Boundary Violations Constituting Serious Misconduct A boundary violation is serious misconduct when the behavior or pattern of behavior results in abuse of the staff/student professional relationship. For example: Conduct that is Romantic or Sexual in Nature: • Sexual physical contact. • Romantic flirtation, propositions, or sexual slurs, leering, epithets, sexual or derogatory comments. • Personal comments about a student's body, sexual jokes, banter, innuendo, notes, stories, drawings, gestures or pictures. • Touching a student's body or clothes in a sexual or intimate way or in a manner that is not age appropriate.

25. Boundary Violations Constituting Serious Misconduct - Continued Social and Other Interactions: • Sending or accompanying students on personal errands unrelated to any legitimate educational purpose. • Furnishing alcohol, drugs or tobacco to a student, or being present where any student is consuming these substances. • Disclosing personal, sexual, family, employment concerns or other private matters to one or more students. • Sharing personal secrets with a student. • Unnecessarily invading a student’s privacy (e.g. walking in on the student in the bathroom). • Taking a student out of class without a legitimate educational purpose.

26. All Staff Have an Obligation to Report Violations of Policy • An adult who observes or has knowledge of another adult's violation of this policy must immediately report the information to the site supervisor. • Remember that all staff are mandated reporters - when an adult observes conduct by another adult that creates a reasonable suspicion of child abuse (including sexual abuse), the adult shall report the conduct to San Francisco’s Family and Children’s Services in accordance with state law, District policy and Administrative Regulation 5141.4 - Child Abuse Prevention and Reporting.

27. Next Steps • Discuss the Policy at a whole site staff meeting. • Prepare a written agenda and take attendance. (Note: all of these requirements are contained in Administrative Regulation 4019.1.) • At the meeting, use the prepared power point to review the content with your staff. • Discuss key points of Policy – If you aren’t able to answer a staff member’s question, note it and ask the Executive Director. • Keep the completed attendance sheet for your records.

28. Reference to Policies & Documents • Board Policy 4019.1, Professional Adult/Student Boundaries • Administrative Regulation 4019.1, Professional Adult/Student Boundaries • School Employee Code of Conduct with Students • Administrative Regulation 5141.4, Child Abuse Prevention and Reporting

29. References • U.S. Department of Education, Office of the Under Secretary, Educator Sexual Misconduct: A Synthesis of Existing Literature, Washington, D.C., 2004. • Praesidium, Abuse Risk Management Training for San Francisco Unified School District, San Francisco, CA, October 2016. • Carol Shakeshaft, Know The Warning Signs Of Educator Sexual Misconduct, V94 N5 kappanmagazine.org. • Mike Patterson and Don Austin, What We Have Learned About K-12 Sex Abuse Claims Since the Letournea Case, NSBA COSA School Law Practice Seminar, Portland, OR, October 2016.

30. Closing Moves With your elbow partner….. …….discuss one thing you learned or were surprised to learn during today’s training.

31. Process Check How did we do on our norms? Turn to an elbow partner and pair share: • Keep equity at the center for students and adults • Be engaged and present • Be part of the solution