Our imperfect world

In a perfect world where bullies don’t exist, our children would be safe—and lawyers would mediate legal challenges with empathy and support rather than antagonism and contempt.

But that wasn’t case in a recent sexual abuse lawsuit brought by a family against the Las Virgenes Unified School District.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of a special education student at Agoura High who was psychologically manipulated and sexually abused by another student. The case finally came to an end with the school district being ordered to pay $300,000 in damages for its role in not doing more to prevent the crime.

At the heart of the “negligent supervision” lawsuit was whether or not a high school can guarantee the safety of its students. But even a well-supervised school bathroom—the physical education locker room is where the Agoura High molestation took place—will offer scant protection for the victim. At public high schools there are plenty of places for students to harass, bully or even assault other students.

Following the incident, the school district created an administrative task force to research bullying and offer solutions. Among other things, the task force found that when other students intervene during a bullying incident, the bully will often stop. Shame is a powerful tool.

The Agoura High legal battle might have been avoided altogether if school administrators had shown more compassion when they were first notified about the assault. Initially, they denied that the abuse occurred, but when irrefutable evidence showed that it had, officials told the family that the sexual conduct between the boys was consensual. A boy with diminished cognitive abilities doesn’t have the ability to consent, however, and the parents won their case.

Denial by the school district did not make the complaint go away, but unfortunately that’s what many of use do when we’re faced with an uncomfortable accusation: We pretend the incident didn’t happen.

In our absolutely imperfect world, the burden to stop bullying cries out for a collaborative approach between teachers, administrators, parents and students—and a complete openmindness about the facts. We hope the school district learned its lesson.

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