- Source: Sexual misconduct
Sexual misconduct is misconduct of a sexual nature which exists on a spectrum that may include a broad range of sexual behaviors considered unwelcome. This includes conduct considered inappropriate on an individual or societal basis of morality, sexual harassment and/or criminal sexual assault.
However generally, from a purely legal standpoint, sexual misconduct is a "lay term" which represents a boundary that has been broken, dictated by a moral set of conduct, particularly where the situation is normally non-sexual and therefore unusual for sexual behavior, or where there is some aspect of personal power or authority that makes sexual behavior inappropriate. A common theme, and the reason for the term misconduct, is that these violations occur during work or in a situation of a power imbalance (such as sexual harassment).
The alleged misconduct can be of various degrees, such as exposure of genitals, assault, aggressive come-ons, pleading, or even inattentiveness to nonverbal cues of discomfort. The "definition of sexual misconduct is far from clear" and it is a "lay term, sometimes used in institutional policies or by professional bodies", to deal with cases marked by power imbalance, coercion, and predatory behaviour."
Definitions
In the legal sense, for a person in a position of authority it includes in particular any sexual activity between them and one of their subordinates. This commonly includes teachers and their students, clergy and their congregants, doctors and their patients, and employers and their employees. While such activity is usually not explicitly illegal, it is often against professional ethical codes. For example, a teacher may be fired and a doctor may have their medical license revoked because of sexual misconduct. In addition, the person in the subordinate position may allege sexual harassment. The University of Iowa defines sexual misconduct as "...unwelcome behavior of a sexual nature that is committed without consent or by force, intimidation, coercion, or manipulation."
Entering a sexual relationship with a subordinate, even when the contact is initiated by the latter, is considered unethical by some because of the subordinate's vulnerability to the superior and the inequality of power that characterizes the relationship. In the case of the doctor-patient relationship, having a sexual relationship with the patient even after the professional relationship has concluded is considered problematic for the physician because of the potential for the patient's continuing dependence on and transference towards the physician. Therefore, sexual relationships with former patients are considered unethical by the medical profession when physicians "use or exploit the trust, knowledge, emotions or influence derived from the previous professional relationship" in any way. By contrast, legal ethics permit sexual relations with former client and, in California, with current clients as well so long as the sex is consensual and is not rendered in exchange for legal services.
Some activities which are not strictly erotic, e.g. mooning (exposing the buttocks), streaking (running naked through a public area) and skinny dipping (swimming naked), are sometimes also categorized as sexual misconduct. Despite these opinions, others believe that sexual relations in workplace settings is not unethical including between boss and employee. Many companies do not prohibit so-called fraternization but instead recognize the difference between consensual dating and improper behavior.
According to Joanne Laucius from the Ottawa Citizen, the "definition of sexual misconduct is far from clear" and the "word 'misconduct' also lacks precision — it can be used as a catch-all for all kinds of behaviour, often obscuring what actually happened". Laucius states that the terms "sexual violence or sexual harassment and assault are much more specific terms that convey the nature of the allegations." Elaine Craig, an associate professor in the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University, states that "[s]exual misconduct is a lay term, sometimes used in institutional policies or by professional bodies. It covers an array of problematic sexual behaviour including sexual harassment, sexual assault and sexual abuse. Two of these terms have specific (and different) legal meanings: Sexual assault has a specific meaning in the criminal law context, unlike sexual misconduct, which may cover both criminal and non-criminal conduct."
Elizabeth Sheehy, the Shirley Greenberg Chair for Women and the Legal Profession at the University of Ottawa, states that "[s]exual misconduct is a social issue and not a fixed line—it shifts as women gain access to economic and political equality. It's not found under criminal law, in human rights codes, or collective agreements. It might be found under professional disciplinary codes." She states that "we don't have a consensus on it, either", "...except that there are three key considerations. First, a power imbalance. Second, coercion, whether implicit or explicit. Third, predatory behaviour." Ally Crockford, a public educator at the Ottawa Rape Crisis Centre, states that "[s]exual misconduct is... a catch-all for behaviour that is not OK, but it's unclear how it should be classified. It could be any number of things—someone is made to feel uncomfortable, or they feel they are being watched or looked at in a certain way."
Michelle Cottle wrote in The Atlantic that the "...almost infinite shades of creepy misbehavior on display are challenging the legal and cultural categories used to describe them", as this issue is, in "...some ways, uncharted territory", making it "...hard to tell how the new lines will be drawn, much less where." Cottle states that "[m]illennials and younger Gen Xers seem to have a broader definition of what constitutes harassment as well as less hesitation about discussing their experiences".
Among educators
A literature review of educator sexual misconduct published by the US Department of Education in 2004 written by researcher Carol Shakeshaft found that 9.6% of high school students have experienced some form of sexual misconduct. Black, Hispanic, and Native American Indian children are at greatest risk for sexual abuse. Also at increased risk are children with disabilities; the reason for this may be their greater need for individual attention and their possible problems with communicating.
Children who have been victims of educator sexual misconduct usually have low self-esteem, and they are likely to develop suicidal ideation and depression. Because the abuser was a person the child was encouraged to trust, they may experience a sense of betrayal.
Shakeshaft also claimed that sexual abuse in public schools "is likely more than 100 times the abuse by priests."
In November 2024, Shakeshaft released a new book called "Organizational Betrayal: How School Enable Sexual Misconduct and How to Stop It. This book largely was researched when she appeared as an expert witness in cases about sexual misconduct and made agreements to be able to use the findings in her research. Otherwise she found it hard to get people to talk about educator sexual misconduct in K-12, which is the area she covers.
She writes in the book that more than the perpetrator is complicit in the continuing child sexual abuse by school employees. She states the entire community bears responsibility from teachers who suspected but did not say anything to administrators who ignored the allegations to leadership. In fact, she writes "We are all complicit."
Shakeshaft concludes that one of the reasons there haven't been more studies on educator sexual misconduct is that as a society there isn't a will to know.
She also states that the problem seems to be increasing from the 9.6 percent figure she found in 2004 to a 17.4 percent of students in public schools who have experienced educator sexual misconduct as found in a study "Title IX Policy Implementation and Sexual Harassment Prevalence in K-12 Schools" by Billie Jo Grant et al published in the 2023 Educational Policy publication using data from the 2018-2019 year.
In their 2002 survey, the American Association of University Women Educational Foundation reported that, of students who had been harassed, 38% were harassed by teachers or other school employees. One survey that was conducted with psychology students reports that 10% had sexual interactions with their educators; in turn, 13% of educators reported sexual interaction with their students. In a national survey conducted for the AAUW Educational Foundation in 2000, it was found that roughly 290,000 students experienced some sort of physical sexual abuse by a public school employee between 1991 and 2000.
In 1995, the CDC replicated part of this study with 8,810 students on 138 college campuses. They examined rape only, and did not look at attempted rape. They found that 20% of women and 4% of men had experienced rape in the course of her or his lifetime.
On campuses, it has been found that alcohol is a prevalent issue in regards to sexual assault. It has been estimated that 1 in 5 women experience an assault, and of those women, 50–75% have had either the attacker, the woman, or both, consume alcohol prior to the assault. Not only has it been a factor in the rates of sexual assault on campus, but because of the prevalence, assaults are also being affected specifically by the inability to give consent when intoxicated and bystanders not knowing when to intervene due to their own intoxication or the intoxication of the victim.
A 2007 survey by the National Institute of Justice found that 19.0% of college women and 6.1% of college men experienced either sexual assault or attempted sexual assault since entering college. In the University of Pennsylvania Law Review in 2017, D. Tuerkheimer reviewed the literature on rape allegations, and reported on the problems surrounding the credibility of rape victims, and how that relates to false rape accusations. She pointed to national survey data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that indicates 1 in every 5 women (and 1 in 71 men) will be raped during their lifetime at some point. Despite the prevalence of rape and the fact that false rape allegations are rare, Tuerkheimer reported that law enforcement officers often default to disbelief about an alleged rape. This documented prejudice leads to reduced investigation and criminal justice outcomes that are faulty compared to other crimes. Tuerkheimer says that women face "credibility discounts" at all stages of the justice system, including from police, jurors, judges, and prosecutors. These credibility discounts are especially pronounced when the victim is acquainted with the accuser, and the vast majority of rapes fall into this category. The U.S. Department of Justice estimated from 2005 to 2007 that about 2% of victims who were raped while incapacitated (from drugs, alcohol, or other reasons) reported the rape to the police, compared to 13% of victims who experienced physically forced sexual assault.
Public schools K-12
While this issue was often discussed in higher education, K-12 Dive states that before 2016 it was rarely discussed in K-12 education despite being prevalent. K-12 Dive also reported the Office of Civil Rights recorded 350 sexual harassment complaints in 2012. By 2022, the Education Department’s civil rights enforcement arm reported more than double the amount at 833.
In public K-12, there has been more focus on educator sexual misconduct in the United States since the 2016 investigation by USA Today "Teachers who sexually abuse students still find classroom jobs." The article states that after a year-long investigation showed, "education officials put children in harm's way by covering up evidence of abuse, keeping allegations secret and making it easy for abusive teachers to find jobs elsewhere." It continued that schoolchildren continue "to be beaten, raped and harassed by their teachers while government officials at every level stand by and do nothing." USA Today found more than 100 teachers who were still working with children despite losing their licenses.
The article states abusive teachers make up an estimated one percent of the total number of teachers. Their investigation showed dozens who were accused of abusive behavior, lost that job, and then got hired at another job around students. This phenomenon is known as "pass the trash."
US News and World Report reported in 2022 that the federal K-12 Elementary and Secondary Education Act, "requires states to adopt laws and policies that prohibit school employers from assisting or 'aiding and abetting' employees or contractors in obtaining a new job if they are 'known or believed, with probably cause, to have engaged in sexual misconduct with a student or minor.'”
The 2015 Every Child Succeeds Act stated that any K-12 organization that got federal money needed to stop predatory teachers from getting new education jobs.
Still as of July 2019, the federal Department of Education lacked authority to ensure district compliance. In July 2019, Frontline Education provided a list of states that did have "Don't Pass the Trash" laws.
In 2024, a Harvard educator wrote that states and districts were still struggling to implement the Every Child Succeeds law's requirements.
After the 2016 USA Today investigation piece was published, there were reforms put into action. The article found "9,000 disciplined teachers were missing from the national teacher misconduct database operated by the non-profit National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification [NASDTEC]. The story and subsequent reports outlined widespread inconsistencies in how states handle teacher background checks and how they report problem teaches to NASDTEC."
In the follow up article, NASDTEC Executive Director Phillip Rogers said they called for an audit of all 50 state agencies about their submissions in the database.
In 2022, the Education Department published a "Study of State Policies to Prohibit Aiding and Abetting Sexual Misconduct" that found uneven policies among states with what is colloquially known as passing the trash. The state educational associations reported that the lack of sharing information between states caused problems. The study did discuss the database from the NASDTEC database that with a paid membership allowed states to track disciplinary actions on teachers licenses. The database was criticized for only including certified teachers.
The Federal Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 was known for trying to support female athletes especially at the collegiate level and to "prohibit sex discrimination in any educational program or activity that receives any federal funding," according to the 2024 Harvard Gazette. In 1992,
Title IX was interpreted to also include sexual harassment and assault.
The Department of Education has redefined the term sexual harassment in a Dear Colleague letter in 2011 and 2020 during the Trump administration, and again in April 2024 issued more regulatory changes. Before 2021, when the Harvard Title IX coordinator described the general idea as "unwelcome conduct on the basis of sex that was severe, persistent, or pervasive, based on the totality of the circumstances" to 2020 where it was change to "severe, persistent, and pervasive" and then in 2024 to "a definition for hostile environment harassment, which is unwelcome sex-based conduct that, based on the totality of the circumstances, is subjectively and objectively offensive and is severe or pervasive."
Districts that have had educator sexual misconduct investigations covered in the media include Redlands Unified School District in California that was featured in the 2023 CBS documentary "Pledge of silence." Others are the Coronado School District in California where a 2019 article was published "Investigations into educator abuse vary wildly from school to school" and Long Island, New York where Newsday in 2024 published an investigation into the secrecy of multiple districts.
The 2016 USA Today piece on how teachers who abuse find new jobs in education stated that, "Private schools and youth organizations are especially at risk. They are left on their own to perform background checks of new hires and generally have no access to the sole tracking system of teachers who were disciplined by state authorities."
The estimated amount of educator sexual misconduct is that one in ten students experiences this between K-12 based on 2004 data largely from public schools. Private schools that do not rely on government money do not need to release information about the rates of educator sexual misconduct. Starting in the late aughts and through the 2010s and into 20s, media reports and school investigations showed that the problem is prevalent in private schools as well.
One of the early disclosures of historical educator misconduct was 2006 at St. Paul's in Concord, New Hampshire that has many times been the center of controversy over student sexual misconduct as well. The 2006 Vanity Fair piece "A Private School Affair" illustrated many of the issues that would be replayed in other sexual misconduct inquiries—resistance by the school, alumni activism, press coverage, concern over reputation, and cultural aspects of elite schools that may contribute to these scandals.
Horace Mann in the Bronx, NY in 2012 was found to have historical educator misconduct was uncovered in 2012 from as far back as the 1960s and often by serial offenders.
After the 2012 media reports, the Boston Globe published an investigation in 2016 on East Coast boarding schools that showed patterns similar to Horace Mann where misconduct was not addressed and added an aspect now called "pass the trash" in public schools where private school teachers were also given good references and sent to other private schools where they reoffended.
Educator sexual misconduct is a broad term that includes verbal and physical sexual abuse, and in 2004, the first study on the topic "The Shakeshaft Report" found that one in ten students experienced sexual misconduct before graduating from high school, and this may be an underestimation since researchers Carol Shakeshaft found that only six percent of students officially reported educator sexual misconduct. A 2020 study by the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights based on data from the 2017-18 school year on sexual assault and rape also showed a growing problem. And a 2020 study "The Nature and Scope of Educator Misconduct in K-12" found the number had increased to 11.7 percent.
= St. Paul's in Concord, New Hampshire
=
One of the early media articles on the subject was the 2006 Vanity Fair article, "A Private School Affair" that includes multiple controversies at St. Paul's School, an exclusive boarding school in Concord, New Hampshire that for more than a century educated the upper crust. The writer Alex Shoumatoff wrote two books on the history of private schools and saw them as microcosms of society.
Shoumatoff, an alumnus of St. Paul's, did not like the press treatment his school received after the controversies over financial impropriety, hazing, a student drowning, and allegations that dozens of teachers sexually abused students from the 1940s to early 1990s.
He reported that the sexual misconduct inquiry started with a student disclosure of past faculty sexual misconduct at a twenty-fifth reunion and some alumni joined a task force to present to the rector (the head). One former student was quoted as saying the board was protecting themselves after hearing first-hand accounts of misconduct.
The article also describes changes in the parent community at St. John's from the "artificial aristocracy" based on wealth and birth was being replaced by what Thomas Jefferson called the "natural aristocracy" of virtue and talent. One rector of St. Paul's in 1996 published an article that stated, ""Although the old-monied families still exert a considerable influence and control over their alma maters, they often do so in ways that reflect their own social and financial insecurities. ... caused the boarding school to do what it has often been accused of doing ... namely, to serve private rather than public interests."
=
A book written about student sexual misconduct in 1990 at St. Paul's that was met with administrative inaction is
Lacy Crawford's "Notes on a Silencing". The 2020 memoir reflects the #MeToo movement that gained prominence in 2017 and Crawford writes about women's uneasy relationships with institutions. The Washington Post's review of the book stated, "The book, which chronicles her assault at a boarding school, is a reminder of how adults willingly and knowingly serve up children to trauma in exchange for maintaining their reputations."
Another significant case involving St. John's was a 2014 sexual assault on freshman Chessy Prout during the "Senior Salute" tradition where senior-year males competed for freshman-year females that resulted in the well-publicized trial where the senior Owen Labrie who maintained the encounter was consensual. Chessy Prout co-wrote the book "I Have a Right to" published in 2018 and her family created a nonprofit with the same name.
In 2023, Prout's parents wrote an opinion article in the Citizen Times that described an institutional approach to treating victims of sexual assault as DARVO, a term coined by psychologist Jennifer Freyd that stands for deny, attack and reverse, victim and offender
A related concept is institutional betrayal another term coined by Jennifer Freyd or Organizational Betrayal, the name for a book coming out on the subject by Carol Shakeshaft, who studies how to prevent educator sexual misconduct.
In 2017, the New Hampshire Attorney General's Office started a criminal investigation into St. Paul's sexual misconduct going back decades but prompted by the Owen Labrie case. A grand jury reviewed thousands of documents and a 2018 settlement was reached that a state overseer would be established at the school. This Independence Compliance Officer's role is to ensure mandatory reports are made and after the first officer quit and reported it was because of retaliation by the school that didn't want investigations into criminal matters, the second officer has released at least one biannual report in July 2021 that found ten new reports of sexual assault.
= Horace Mann in Bronx, NY
=
In 2012, the New York Times Magazine feature "Prep School Predators: Horace Mann School's Secret History of Sexual Abuse" was an early example of private school controversies that the writer Amos Kamil later made into a 2015 book, "Great is the truth: Secrecy, scandal and the quest for justice at Horace Mann School." This uncovered three teachers who had serially molested students at this elite private preK-12 in Bronx, New York from as far back as the 1960s that many administrators knew about but didn't stop, which also got coverage in New York Magazine and Newsweek in 2015.
Newsweek's 2015 piece on Horace Mann starts with a quote from the alumni group Making Schools Safe that independently funded an investigation when the school did not act, "Our goal is not to rehash or accuse, but simply to understand how more than twenty abusers operated for decades with little fear of reprisal."
= Thacher School in Ojai, CA
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This Boston Globe 2016 investigation prompted schools like the boarding school Thacher in Ojai, California to start investigations. Thacher eventually published two reports of historical sexual misconduct the last one issued in 2023. With the first report, the then-head of school Blossom Pidduck apologized for the historical failures. Past students who were interviewed for the investigation said that when they complained at the time of the instances, they were met with "indifference and shame," according to the New York Times.
This 2021 article states that the findings from the first Thacher report "echoes accusations that have roiled other prep schools in the last decade." The Venture County District Attorney's office said in December 2022 that it found more than 50 instances where the school failed to make a mandated report but that it was past the statute of limitations for those issues.
The National Association of Independent Schools' blog in 2021 that responded five years later to this Boston Globe article and was titled "The long-term vision for healing abuse on campus" that asked, "Was it more shocking that abuse happened or that schools worked so hard to conceal the truth?" The writer Vanessa Orange states, "Prestige has its pitfalls; the illusion of perfection can get in the way of acknowledging problems...Taking ownership of a problem on campus is an investment in trust between a school and the public."
Ten percent of United States students attended private schools in the 2021-22 school year, according to Pew Research. Public schools operate under federal Title IX rules for sexual harassment and discrimination and the federal K-12 law, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, suggests states pass laws to prevent educator sexual misconduct. These laws do not apply to private schools.
= St. Anne's in Brooklyn, NY
=
In 2024, New York Magazine published an article "The Shame of St. Anne's" about a 37-year-old teacher at the elite Brooklyn private school, Winston Nguyen, who had been arrested and charged with eleven felonies that included posing as a student on Snapchat and asking St. Anne's students to send him sexual images. Nguyen had served prison time for fraud before joining St. Anne's and that was known before his hire.
The article stated, "Parents say they feared interrogating leadership about Nguyen could be interpreted as their clashing with the school's liberal bent, and none of the 12 interviewed for this article would speak with their names attached, out of fear that they would upset the administration or get canceled by other parents for breaking ranks."
This is after a 2019 letter went out to parents with the results of an independent firm's sexual misconduct investigation that found nineteen former St. Anne's teachers or staff who had potentially engaged in inappropriate behavior or sexual misconduct from the 1970s to 2017.
=
Vanity Fair Magazine covered similar scandals in feature articles "The Prep School and Predator"
about Marlborough School in Los Angeles in March 2015, "St. George's Hidden Dragons" about St. George's in Rhode Island in 2016, "Dangerous Privilege" in 2016 also about St. Paul's, "The Code of Silence" in 2019 about Brett Kavanaugh's Georgetown Prep in Bethesda, Maryland, and "Mr. Weber's Confession" about Phillips Exeter in Exeter, New Hampshire in 2021.
In 2016, the Boston Globe published an article about sexual misconduct at New England boarding schools titled, "Private Schools, Painful Secrets: Educators accused of sexual misconduct often find new posts" that revealed trends on the subject that were not well known before this story.
In the overview video, the then-executive director of the Association of Boarding Schools Peter Upham said, "Thirty years ago wrongly or rightly, and it was probably wrongly, a lot of abuse was handled quietly. And what I think that demonstrated was a failure to recognize that people who abuse are likely to abuse again."
The Boston Globe's 2016 investigation surveyed all the boarding schools and got responses from ten percent of them. The investigation found that at least 67 private schools in New England were accused of employees abusing or harassing at least 200 students since 1991. This included eleven cases where employees who faced sexual misconduct and then went on to work at other schools.
This Boston Globe's Spotlight Team's investigation determined that boarding schools did not find the balance between investigating sexual misconduct allegations and protecting their reputation. That the schools often originally concealed or ignored allegations. In 2016, the article states that as private institutions the boarding schools were exempt from public records laws.
The article states that it can take decades for victims to report sexual misconduct in school. In the 2010s, this culture began shifting as victims began publicly describing their sexual misconduct from schools such as St. George's where in 2016 an investigation found 50 credible allegations of sexual misconduct by both staff and students; Phillips Exeter Academy that in 2016 admitted to not disclosing an award-winning teacher's sexual misconduct in the 1970s and 80s that led to other disclosures; and the boys' preK-9 day and boarding school the Fesseden School in Massachusetts that in 2016 also had extensive educator sexual misconduct uncovered from as far back as the 1960s. A commonality in these investigations is that they were often not reported to the law enforcement or child protective services as in some cases is mandated by law.
Other private schools that received media coverage for sexual misconduct include Presentation High School in San Jose, CA in 2018 Caitlin Gable School in Portland, OR; Cate School in Carpenteria, CA in 2022; and Greater Atlanta Christian (GAC) School in Norcross, Atlanta in 2024 among others.
See also
Buddhist ethics § Sexual misconduct
Professional boundaries
Sexual abuse
Sexual bullying
Sexual ethics
Weinstein effect
References
Notes
Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs (Nov 20, 1991). "Sexual misconduct in the practice of medicine". JAMA. 266 (19). American Medical Association: 2741–5. doi:10.1001/jama.266.19.2741.
West, SG; Hatters-Friedman, S; Knoll, JL IV. (2010). "Lessons to learn: female educators who sexually abuse their students". Psychiatric Times. 27 (8): 9–10.
External links
Media related to Sexual misconduct at Wikimedia Commons
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