Taking Aim at Sexual Harassment

 A recent article in the Washington Post suggests that sexual harassment on school buses is on the rise. The newspaper detailed several accounts of sexual assaults on buses operated by suburban Washington, D.C., school districts, including one in which a 6-year-old girl was allegedly fondled by a middle-school student.

“Sexual harassment is a much more serious issue in public schools than most people are willing to admit,” Robert Shoop, a professor at Kansas State University, told the Post. “And it’s much more likely to occur in unsupervised venues, like buses or bathrooms.”

Shoop said the incidence of sexual harassment on buses is increasing because society has become “more sexualized and less civil.”

A Look at the Issue

John Matthews, transportation director at Montgomery County Public Schools in Rockville, Md., agrees that sexual harassment is a growing problem among students. “I don’t believe it’s just a perception,” he said. “I believe we have a changing trend here.”

The Post article reported that 26 alleged incidents of sexual harassment had taken place on Montgomery County buses since the start of the school year.

In response, Montgomery County school officials are looking at policies regarding harassment and have formed working groups, one of which includes bus drivers, to address the problem.

Matthews said some of the actions will be taken systemwide. An information campaign through various media will focus on parents. Meanwhile, students could see the addition of a sexual harassment component to their curriculum.

The transportation department is taking its own steps to deter student-to-student sexual harassment. “We’re looking at developing programs to sensitize people as to what to look for, how to report it, who to report it to and what actions to take,” Matthews said.

Matthews said all employees receive training in sexual harassment, but he sees a need for more specialized instruction. “We need to make sure that people are sensitive to what is appropriate and not appropriate and to bring awareness to the fact that this is a growing problem that we need to be on the lookout for,” he said.

In addition, Matthews said drivers have been successful in the past by taking an informal approach to behavior management. “I would assume that most confrontations on the bus are dealt with that way,” he said. “Maybe now these things should be dealt with formally. We want to bring to people’s minds an awareness that things that appear innocent might not be. We need to be more vigilant.”

Another strategy to curtail the problem is to equip more of the 1,250 buses in Montgomery County’s fleet with video surveillance systems. Currently, only 20 buses have cameras. “We’re reviewing the vendors right now and hope to have cameras in place by the start of the [2005-06] school year,” Matthews said.

Taking the Issue to Legislators

In Tennessee, the state legislature recently enacted two bills aimed at deterring sexual harassment and bullying at schools. One of the measures requires that school districts adopt policies by Jan. 1, 2006, that prohibit harassment, intimidation and bullying. It also extends liability immunity to any school employee who promptly reports an incident of harassment or bullying.

The other bill requires the Tennessee Board of Education to develop guidelines for a high school curriculum on sexual violence awareness and prevention. School districts are required to implement a program by the start of the 2006-07 school year.

Based on the two bills, the Tennessee Association of Pupil Transportation is developing guidelines and training materials that will assist the state’s driver trainers, according to Larry Riggsbee, the association’s executive secretary and transportation director at Sumner County Schools.

“We hope to influence the state Board of Education to include the school bus in the high school curriculum on sexual violence awareness and prevention,” Riggsbee said. “In our state, the student rules that apply to a classroom also apply to the school bus. The bus is considered an extension of the classroom.”