 |
||||||||
 |
||||||||
|
||||||||
|
Students tell of high sexual atmosphere
By ROBERT KING, Times Staff Writer
SPRING HILL -- Middle schools have long dealt with raging hormones and crude behavior from students, but Fox Chapel Middle School seems to be getting more than its fair share. In 1999, a 15-year-old girl pleaded no contest to a battery charge after an investigation into whether she performed oral sex on a boy in the middle of a crowded science classroom at Fox Chapel. Last year, School Board member Gail David was at Fox Chapel to be interviewed by three seventh-graders for their social studies project, but she wound up hearing horror stories instead. David said the girls described a sexually charged atmosphere at Fox Chapel that takes on a different aspect depending on the day of the week, literally. Tuesdays, for instance, Fox Chapel boys routinely twisted girls' nipples. Thursdays were for thongs. On Wednesdays, girls reached into boys' pants. On Freaky Fridays, anything goes. Hernando County sheriff's deputies investigated an Oct. 11 incident, during which a Fox Chapel student held a knife to the throats of two girls while grabbing their breasts. The boy was charged with aggravated assault and committing a lewd and lascivious act. David said it may be the most serious incident of student misbehavior this year. She worries that it may be the result of a broader tolerance at Fox Chapel for student sexual harassment. Board member Sandra Nicholson even suggested that Fox Chapel should perhaps be a test site for gender-isolated education. In other words: Put the boys and girls in separate classes. That may be premature, officials say. Powell Middle School principal Cy Wingrove said his and every other middle school deals with inappropriate touching among students. But David is frustrated. "I don't know if it's indicative of growing sexual awareness of the age or if it was a problem at that particular school," David said. "We have all these fail safe measures and nothing worked in this situation." After hearing the Fox Chapel seventh-graders describe the activities last year, David confronted Dave Schoelles, the school's principal, and mentioned it to Superintendent Wendy Tellone. But, with anger in her voice, David brought the issue directly to a School Board workshop on Tuesday because she thinks Fox Chapel's staff was too slow to report this latest incident to the Sheriff's Office. A school district inquiry into that was incomplete Wednesday. David said the three girls who clued her into the problem last year said they wouldn't report their concerns to the school because they felt nothing would be done about it. In the Oct. 11 incident, one of the girls told a deputy that the boy who attacked her had pinched her breasts several times before, but she had not reported it. She felt nothing would be done, according to the incident report. Schoelles doesn't consider his school that different from others except that incidents at Fox Chapel find their way into the newspapers. Last year, there was a two-week period when the school had several reports of inappropriate touching among the sixth-grade class. This year, it has been less of an issue, with perhaps one or two complaints per week. Some of the younger kids don't realize the sexual connotations of the touching, Schoelles said. For them, touching breasts is part of a larger problem of inappropriate touching common to sixth-graders. For them, he said, it's similar to arm punches, choke holds and frogging with a knuckle on the backbone. And the inappropriate behavior goes both ways, he said: Girls are culprits too. When problems arise, Schoelles said, he and his staff try immediately to deal with the individuals engaged in the behavior. If necessary, he and his staff will go classroom to classroom to address matters, as was the case last year. And when policy or state law calls for it, they report it to police. Beyond that, Schoelles said, sexual harassment issues are addressed at the beginning of the year when teachers go over the student conduct code. It is also a part of health classes and special programs put on by law enforcement. In this recent case, assistant principal Sharon Bray queried students the same day she heard about it. She reported it to a sheriff's deputy by the end of the day, as students were leaving on a Friday. It would have been reported sooner, Schoelles said, but Bray's duties prevented it. The deputy followed up her investigation on Monday. Some Fox Chapel parents say such behavior is news to them. Others say it's not. Vonette Airall, whose daughter is an eighth-grader, said her daughter has seen boys grab girls in inappropriate places. She says some girls entice the boys to act as they do. Her answer: Training her daughter to defend herself and to not entice boys to behave that way. Laura Wright, meanwhile, says she chose to put her daughter in Fox Chapel because the administration knows how to deal with problems. Wright said she doubts that Fox Chapel is different from any other school. "At this age level, you are going to have problems no matter what," she said.
 © 2006 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 
|
From today's Hernando Times Letters |
