“There were classic signs that should have been detected...”
September 15, 2016 4:56 PM Subscribe
Drama at an Elite High School by Suzy Khimm [New York Magazine] A beloved theater teacher, sexual-assault allegations, and the scandal that has rattled Chappaqua. A longtime Chappaqua theater teacher is accused of abusing students for years, until one told the police.
Jesus this guy looks exactly like you'd imagine a high school drama teacher who would do this to his students would look.
posted by Aizkolari at 5:29 PM on September 15, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Aizkolari at 5:29 PM on September 15, 2016 [1 favorite]
Jesus this guy looks exactly like you'd imagine a high school drama teacher who would do this to his students would look.
I was picturing the teacher in my high school who was arrested for sex with students; I think most high schools have these teachers at one point or another.
Though they looked different, the boundary crossing and the flattering students by treating them "like adults" and creating the false intimacy was exactly the same. Predators use the method that works, I guess.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:35 PM on September 15, 2016 [6 favorites]
I was picturing the teacher in my high school who was arrested for sex with students; I think most high schools have these teachers at one point or another.
Though they looked different, the boundary crossing and the flattering students by treating them "like adults" and creating the false intimacy was exactly the same. Predators use the method that works, I guess.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:35 PM on September 15, 2016 [6 favorites]
I was picturing the teacher in my high school who was arrested for sex with students; I think most high schools have these teachers at one point or another.
Yeah, we had one at my school. 12th grade English. It was common knowledge. Such a shame, because he really was a great teacher; he just couldn't lay off the young girls. He married one of his students right after graduation, but years later she divorced him over another one. A few years after I graduated and left town I heard he had finally been dismissed; I don't know what the tipping point was that finally made the administration act after all that time.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 5:50 PM on September 15, 2016 [1 favorite]
Yeah, we had one at my school. 12th grade English. It was common knowledge. Such a shame, because he really was a great teacher; he just couldn't lay off the young girls. He married one of his students right after graduation, but years later she divorced him over another one. A few years after I graduated and left town I heard he had finally been dismissed; I don't know what the tipping point was that finally made the administration act after all that time.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 5:50 PM on September 15, 2016 [1 favorite]
I dunno, I thought that this bit early in the piece made him sound like a massive tool: “I don’t do high-school shows,” Schraufnagel often told his students. “I do professional productions with young actors.” Holy shit, that's like something out of Strangers With Candy.
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:37 PM on September 15, 2016 [17 favorites]
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:37 PM on September 15, 2016 [17 favorites]
I went to Horace Mann, so I am familiar with this type of situation. The administration in Chappaqua seems to have an attitude similar to Horace Mann's a decade or two ago, where teachers who are perceived as having created a certain atmosphere of sophisticated achievement can do as they please. But now they understand how that presents a liability and notoriety issue
posted by knoyers at 6:38 PM on September 15, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by knoyers at 6:38 PM on September 15, 2016 [3 favorites]
I dunno, I thought that this bit early in the piece made him sound like a massive tool: “I don’t do high-school shows,” Schraufnagel often told his students. “I do professional productions with young actors.” Holy shit, that's like something out of Strangers With Candy.
You're right, and I would have bought the hell out of it when I was a teenager. My drama teachers were demanding and eccentric, and also very on the level with us, but none of them were predators. At least, I hope not; I hope it wasn't just that no one dared to say.
posted by Countess Elena at 6:41 PM on September 15, 2016 [2 favorites]
You're right, and I would have bought the hell out of it when I was a teenager. My drama teachers were demanding and eccentric, and also very on the level with us, but none of them were predators. At least, I hope not; I hope it wasn't just that no one dared to say.
posted by Countess Elena at 6:41 PM on September 15, 2016 [2 favorites]
flattering students by treating them "like adults"
that's the line, but plenty of the students quoted were aware enough to see and say that he created this peer-among-peers atmosphere not by treating them like adults, but by treating himself like a teenager. It's just that teenagers are teenagers and don't actually know what kind of treatment adults deserve and demand. (see: respect, professionalism, a certain creation of boundaries and a limit to pressured intimacy.)
I should have no pity for him and I assure metafilter that I don't, but this whole scenario pre-abuse, if there was a time pre-abuse, is everything that used to terrify me about the grim spectre of becoming a fancy private-school teacher as an academic failure - that the demands of the profession force your whole social and emotional and intellectual life to be lived among bright, intense kids until you make them your friends because the alternative is total isolation until the inevitable pathetic Dead Poet's Society regression-collapse. (note please that I do not think sexual abuse is inevitable, just the rest of it. to understand all is not to forgive all.)
posted by queenofbithynia at 6:57 PM on September 15, 2016 [16 favorites]
that's the line, but plenty of the students quoted were aware enough to see and say that he created this peer-among-peers atmosphere not by treating them like adults, but by treating himself like a teenager. It's just that teenagers are teenagers and don't actually know what kind of treatment adults deserve and demand. (see: respect, professionalism, a certain creation of boundaries and a limit to pressured intimacy.)
I should have no pity for him and I assure metafilter that I don't, but this whole scenario pre-abuse, if there was a time pre-abuse, is everything that used to terrify me about the grim spectre of becoming a fancy private-school teacher as an academic failure - that the demands of the profession force your whole social and emotional and intellectual life to be lived among bright, intense kids until you make them your friends because the alternative is total isolation until the inevitable pathetic Dead Poet's Society regression-collapse. (note please that I do not think sexual abuse is inevitable, just the rest of it. to understand all is not to forgive all.)
posted by queenofbithynia at 6:57 PM on September 15, 2016 [16 favorites]
I'm constantly baffled by the way we infantilize fully grown white men who choose to commit sexual assault and rape. The article seems to reiterate how the teacher is basically just a "big kid" who somehow "didn't know what he was doing" every other paragraph. I'm willing to bet that the people who buy into these conceptions are also the ones who refuse to teach boys any boundaries by saying "boys will be boys", and who defend young men who repeatedly transgress boundaries by saying that they're just "socially awkward". Is there any stage in a white man's life where they are not excused from learning the social no-nos that the rest of us have been following since kindergarten?
posted by Conspire at 6:59 PM on September 15, 2016 [41 favorites]
posted by Conspire at 6:59 PM on September 15, 2016 [41 favorites]
One time, after she was cast in the title role for Antigone, Hamilton was feeling self-conscious about her weight. Schraufnagel joked that the costume budget should “factor in a tapeworm,” prompting Hamilton to tell him to “go fuck himself,” which they all laughed about later, Chatzky recalls. “He taught her not to be afraid of her own opinion.”
One doesn't like to be facetious about such a criminal creep but lol nevertheless. "which they all laughed about later," I'm sure. what a charming and terrific and bold and roguish mentor for a gal to have.
posted by queenofbithynia at 7:02 PM on September 15, 2016 [5 favorites]
One doesn't like to be facetious about such a criminal creep but lol nevertheless. "which they all laughed about later," I'm sure. what a charming and terrific and bold and roguish mentor for a gal to have.
posted by queenofbithynia at 7:02 PM on September 15, 2016 [5 favorites]
this whole scenario pre-abuse, if there was a time pre-abuse, is everything that used to terrify me about the grim spectre of becoming a fancy private-school teacher as an academic failure - that the demands of the profession force your whole social and emotional and intellectual life to be lived among bright, intense kids until you make them your friends because the alternative is total isolation until the inevitable pathetic Dead Poet's Society regression-collapse.I dunno. He seems to have had a pretty normal life: he had a husband and an apartment in Manhattan and hobbies and presumably friends. He didn't have to befriend teenagers or treat them like peers. He chose to do that. Many high school teachers are normal grownups with normal grownup lives for whom being a teacher is a job.
Source: my mom was a high-school teacher, and my brother is one currently.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 7:03 PM on September 15, 2016 [4 favorites]
Many high school teachers are normal grownups with normal grownup lives for whom being a teacher is a job.
I have heard such rumors! and I understand this place wasn't a secluded residential boarding school where teachers live on campus and are chaperones and guardians and in the atmosphere 24 hours a day, like the places that scared me, but he seems to have done his best to live as though at least his part of it was a place like that, what with the scenery-building-till-midnight and so on. don't know if it's possible to make drama kids adore you without embracing that lifestyle but from an adult perspective there is something not right about it. especially since he did have a husband to go home to!
The rebel art teachers I loved as a youth were also drug-addled burnouts who didn't seem to be so different in their 30s/40s from what I imagined them to have been as younger men, like this guy, but also they hated their jobs and barely disguised it and were nice enough to some random selection of kids they liked but clearly could not wait to clock out every day and go drinking with people old enough to buy drinks for an underpaid art teacher. or whatever it was they did that didn't involve hanging about the school in the evening hours. which is the main reason I don't think any/many of them were predators.
posted by queenofbithynia at 7:15 PM on September 15, 2016 [1 favorite]
I have heard such rumors! and I understand this place wasn't a secluded residential boarding school where teachers live on campus and are chaperones and guardians and in the atmosphere 24 hours a day, like the places that scared me, but he seems to have done his best to live as though at least his part of it was a place like that, what with the scenery-building-till-midnight and so on. don't know if it's possible to make drama kids adore you without embracing that lifestyle but from an adult perspective there is something not right about it. especially since he did have a husband to go home to!
The rebel art teachers I loved as a youth were also drug-addled burnouts who didn't seem to be so different in their 30s/40s from what I imagined them to have been as younger men, like this guy, but also they hated their jobs and barely disguised it and were nice enough to some random selection of kids they liked but clearly could not wait to clock out every day and go drinking with people old enough to buy drinks for an underpaid art teacher. or whatever it was they did that didn't involve hanging about the school in the evening hours. which is the main reason I don't think any/many of them were predators.
posted by queenofbithynia at 7:15 PM on September 15, 2016 [1 favorite]
Having dug into the article some more, I concur with Countess Elena above. I wasn't a drama kid, but if I had been allowed in a circle like the Theater Repertory described in the article when I was in high school, I wouldn't have drunk the Kool-Aid, I'd have mainlined it.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:32 PM on September 15, 2016 [10 favorites]
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:32 PM on September 15, 2016 [10 favorites]
Such a shame, because he really was a great teacher
Pretty clearly not, I would say.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 7:45 PM on September 15, 2016 [12 favorites]
Pretty clearly not, I would say.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 7:45 PM on September 15, 2016 [12 favorites]
I went to Horace Greeley High School in the 70s, and the drama department was incredible back then as well. Some of my friends are still friends on facebook with the drama teacher from those days, who was not a tool like this guy. Was there pressure to keep up that legacy at all? It was a real source of joy for a lot of people and I have fond memories of some of those shows. I was nerdy and sheltered, but as far as I knew there was none of this going on. Reading the article, I had no sense of connection to that time.
There were some really eccentric teachers at that school and the parents were totally into it. It was the 70s though.
posted by maggiemaggie at 8:21 PM on September 15, 2016
There were some really eccentric teachers at that school and the parents were totally into it. It was the 70s though.
posted by maggiemaggie at 8:21 PM on September 15, 2016
Shortly before Schraufnagel was scheduled to appear in Chappaqua town court this August, I sat down with another former student at a nearby coffee shop; I’ll call him Robert. He isn’t one of the three students from the criminal case, but he spent more time with Schraufnagel than nearly anyone else at Greeley and is now prosecutors’ lead witness in the criminal case, he says. During his three years in the theater program with Schraufnagel, Robert estimates that he was at the theater about 50 hours a week, during which time he saw several instances of what he now describes as “grossly inappropriate” sexually charged behavior by his teacher. Though he was never abused himself, Robert now believes that Schraufnagel likely had designs on him, too. “Had I known to look out for the kind of comments he was directing at me, I think I would have picked up on the fact that I was indeed at risk of falling victim to his scheme,” he says.
Robert, now 18 and in college, still lights up when he talks about the artistic triumphs of Greeley’s theater program; he particularly loved Little Shop of Horrors, whose talking Venus flytraps were done up in glorious Technicolor. But since last year’s Springfest, he’s been reconsidering his experience. “Was all my work just for nothing?” asks Robert. “Was it for the good part of it — for the good of the theater? Or was I part of his system?”
This is how abusers roll.
Transpose theatre with hockey.
Today, we learned that Graham James was granted full parole. Among others, he sexually assaulted Sheldon Kennedy and Theoren (Theo) Fleury.
It took forever to get a few charges to stick.
For students who felt like the affluent suburb was a straightjacket — the artsy kids, the closeted teens, the aspiring thespians — the Schrauffice was a small oasis. Schraufnagel’s office was just behind the stage, in a building on the edge of campus devoted to the performing arts, and the door was always open: Students were in there at all hours of the day, having lunch, gossiping, doing their homework, or just shooting the breeze with their favorite teacher. Schraufnagel would often talk about the plays that he loved (the revival of August: Osage County, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson) or the ones that he hated (Wicked). But the conversations would just as frequently turn to their own lives, and Schraufnagel’s.
Yeah, see. Through this star system is a way out. You just have to stick with me.
Fleury recently appeared on the Mental Illness Happy Hour and touches on that.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 8:43 PM on September 15, 2016 [9 favorites]
Robert, now 18 and in college, still lights up when he talks about the artistic triumphs of Greeley’s theater program; he particularly loved Little Shop of Horrors, whose talking Venus flytraps were done up in glorious Technicolor. But since last year’s Springfest, he’s been reconsidering his experience. “Was all my work just for nothing?” asks Robert. “Was it for the good part of it — for the good of the theater? Or was I part of his system?”
This is how abusers roll.
Transpose theatre with hockey.
Today, we learned that Graham James was granted full parole. Among others, he sexually assaulted Sheldon Kennedy and Theoren (Theo) Fleury.
It took forever to get a few charges to stick.
For students who felt like the affluent suburb was a straightjacket — the artsy kids, the closeted teens, the aspiring thespians — the Schrauffice was a small oasis. Schraufnagel’s office was just behind the stage, in a building on the edge of campus devoted to the performing arts, and the door was always open: Students were in there at all hours of the day, having lunch, gossiping, doing their homework, or just shooting the breeze with their favorite teacher. Schraufnagel would often talk about the plays that he loved (the revival of August: Osage County, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson) or the ones that he hated (Wicked). But the conversations would just as frequently turn to their own lives, and Schraufnagel’s.
Yeah, see. Through this star system is a way out. You just have to stick with me.
Fleury recently appeared on the Mental Illness Happy Hour and touches on that.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 8:43 PM on September 15, 2016 [9 favorites]
You're right, and I would have bought the hell out of it when I was a teenager. My drama teachers were demanding and eccentric, and also very on the level with us, but none of them were predators. At least, I hope not; I hope it wasn't just that no one dared to say.
my favourite drama teacher - who was a lot like this one, only more grizzled - also turned out to be sexually harrassing and abusing students.
I was obviously upset - because this person I idolized was so clearly deeply flawed, but also because I felt so unattractive, since he'd never acted anything but paternal to me. (sounds callous, but it was a thought I couldn't help but have at the time, being a teen).
posted by jb at 10:15 PM on September 15, 2016 [12 favorites]
my favourite drama teacher - who was a lot like this one, only more grizzled - also turned out to be sexually harrassing and abusing students.
I was obviously upset - because this person I idolized was so clearly deeply flawed, but also because I felt so unattractive, since he'd never acted anything but paternal to me. (sounds callous, but it was a thought I couldn't help but have at the time, being a teen).
posted by jb at 10:15 PM on September 15, 2016 [12 favorites]
jb: "I was obviously upset - because this person I idolized was so clearly deeply flawed, but also because I felt so unattractive"
Being a teenager is extremely complicated, it always has been and will forever be. This remarkably honest statement is a very good illustration of why Schraufnagel and his ilk can do what they do, and get away with it for years.
posted by chavenet at 1:46 AM on September 16, 2016 [8 favorites]
Being a teenager is extremely complicated, it always has been and will forever be. This remarkably honest statement is a very good illustration of why Schraufnagel and his ilk can do what they do, and get away with it for years.
posted by chavenet at 1:46 AM on September 16, 2016 [8 favorites]
The high school I went to was certainly no Horace Mann, but at the time it had the reputation of being the "best high school in the region", and I can think of... 4? 5? teachers who were widely known to be sexual predators. The school administration cultivated this attitude of "goodness, why are these annoying, dramatic youngsters trying to create trouble in the lives of these upstanding educators?" and the whole community, myself included, bought into the idea that these were just bored kids coming up with scandalous rumors. I even kinda believed that after two different teachers (both of whom groomed me by treating me like I was amazingly gifted/"more adult" than my peers) initiated sexual contact with me. The accusations were always just laughed of SO summarily that I felt like what happened to me couldn't have actually happened, you know? I must have imagined it.
posted by Pizzarina Sbarro at 3:36 AM on September 16, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by Pizzarina Sbarro at 3:36 AM on September 16, 2016 [2 favorites]
One of my red flags as a supervisor of high school teachers was "favorite teacher." I tended to have heightened alertness about those teachers, and I was much more likely to swing by their rooms and make sure they didn't have their doors closed while they only had one or two students in there. Teachers I most worried about were the ones who most inspired their students and who were still in contact with them after they graduated. Kids have terrible taste in adults at that age, and worship people who inspire them. Adults who make close friends of their students also have terrible taste in children, as well.
I used to call the annual teaching award voted on by students the "kiss of death award," because it usually meant someone with boundary issues or no perspective, someone who was going to get canned soon, or someone who would retire abruptly.
posted by Peach at 5:38 AM on September 16, 2016 [22 favorites]
I used to call the annual teaching award voted on by students the "kiss of death award," because it usually meant someone with boundary issues or no perspective, someone who was going to get canned soon, or someone who would retire abruptly.
posted by Peach at 5:38 AM on September 16, 2016 [22 favorites]
I hear you, Peach. Regressive adults with charisma seem particularly alluring to adolescents, who are necessarily engaged in an age-appropriate search for/questioning of identity. Whenever I happen to meet someone patently charismatic, who spends a lot of time around an adoring kid-fanbase (i.e. if they are a teacher, coach, youth director, etc.), I assume they are sketchy - possibly predatory, even - unless proven otherwise.
posted by Bob Regular at 6:29 AM on September 16, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Bob Regular at 6:29 AM on September 16, 2016 [1 favorite]
The thing that enrages me about this so much is that at my high school, theater was pretty much the only safe space for queer kids. Things are probably a bit better now, but I bet it still functions that way to a large extent. It just seems particularly vile to use that refuge to prey on kids.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:31 AM on September 16, 2016 [10 favorites]
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:31 AM on September 16, 2016 [10 favorites]
Teachers I most worried about were the ones who most inspired their students and who were still in contact with them after they graduated.
I hear you, and I'm glad you were on that job, but did you really draw that line so far back? I am still, in my thirties, in contact with some of these teachers, and I even spent a summer with a married couple about sixteen years ago. The teenager is a maddening creature, and I'm grateful for anyone who voluntarily dedicates their life to dealing with them; they should at least have the reward of seeing that a real adult resulted from their work.
I was obviously upset - because this person I idolized was so clearly deeply flawed, but also because I felt so unattractive, since he'd never acted anything but paternal to me. (sounds callous, but it was a thought I couldn't help but have at the time, being a teen).
No, I understand completely. I thought I was safe from child molesters and, later, from boys, because I was fat and ugly. Everyone told me so, except my mom and dad, but who listens to them? (I was in fact a beautiful child, but I only know this from photographs, and my attitude did nothing but set me up to wander into bad situations later in life.)
posted by Countess Elena at 7:28 AM on September 16, 2016 [1 favorite]
I hear you, and I'm glad you were on that job, but did you really draw that line so far back? I am still, in my thirties, in contact with some of these teachers, and I even spent a summer with a married couple about sixteen years ago. The teenager is a maddening creature, and I'm grateful for anyone who voluntarily dedicates their life to dealing with them; they should at least have the reward of seeing that a real adult resulted from their work.
I was obviously upset - because this person I idolized was so clearly deeply flawed, but also because I felt so unattractive, since he'd never acted anything but paternal to me. (sounds callous, but it was a thought I couldn't help but have at the time, being a teen).
No, I understand completely. I thought I was safe from child molesters and, later, from boys, because I was fat and ugly. Everyone told me so, except my mom and dad, but who listens to them? (I was in fact a beautiful child, but I only know this from photographs, and my attitude did nothing but set me up to wander into bad situations later in life.)
posted by Countess Elena at 7:28 AM on September 16, 2016 [1 favorite]
Teachers I most worried about were the ones who most inspired their students and who were still in contact with them after they graduated.
there are teachers who can be like this and still maintain appropriate boundaries. My husband kept in contact with his grade six teacher and a choir director (who are themselves friends). They even came to our wedding.
But maybe it was different because he knew them when he was 11, and they definitely viewed him as a child. I had the same grade six teacher, and she certainly wasn't 'cool' or treating us as adults; she treated us as bright, but immature children.
posted by jb at 7:59 AM on September 16, 2016 [1 favorite]
there are teachers who can be like this and still maintain appropriate boundaries. My husband kept in contact with his grade six teacher and a choir director (who are themselves friends). They even came to our wedding.
But maybe it was different because he knew them when he was 11, and they definitely viewed him as a child. I had the same grade six teacher, and she certainly wasn't 'cool' or treating us as adults; she treated us as bright, but immature children.
posted by jb at 7:59 AM on September 16, 2016 [1 favorite]
Some of them were great. They were just the ones I worried most about. Teachers who didn't have a close bond with their students were a different set of problems and often more easily dealt with.
And I am still friends (post college even Facebook friends, no filter) with some of my former students.
posted by Peach at 8:11 AM on September 16, 2016
And I am still friends (post college even Facebook friends, no filter) with some of my former students.
posted by Peach at 8:11 AM on September 16, 2016
> I wasn't a drama kid, but if I had been allowed in a circle like the Theater Repertory described in the article when I was in high school, I wouldn't have drunk the Kool-Aid, I'd have mainlined it.
I was a drama-club kid, and I would've killed for a teacher like that. "Like that" meaning respecting the intellect of teenagers and refraining from the facile condescending lies that many adults pass of as "guidance." Not "like that" as in having sexual relationships with his students and narcissistic intimidation. JESUS CHRIST. My heart goes out to those kids for how Schraufnagel betrayed their trust and admiration of him.
posted by desuetude at 8:13 AM on September 16, 2016 [2 favorites]
I was a drama-club kid, and I would've killed for a teacher like that. "Like that" meaning respecting the intellect of teenagers and refraining from the facile condescending lies that many adults pass of as "guidance." Not "like that" as in having sexual relationships with his students and narcissistic intimidation. JESUS CHRIST. My heart goes out to those kids for how Schraufnagel betrayed their trust and admiration of him.
posted by desuetude at 8:13 AM on September 16, 2016 [2 favorites]
I hear you Peach. I was a victim in middle school of the "coolest teacher" who turned out to be buying 14 year olds beer, and grooming a whole crew of young girls for potential sexual abuse. The teacher was 24, it was a Lutheran school, and the end result was a covert non-renewal of contract without exposing what he was doing. (I say "potential" sexual abuse because I have not heard that he actually did more than kiss the girls and hold hands with them. I've no doubt he was working up to worse things, however.) I'm pretty sure he ran off to Florida and became a Scientologist. (lolwtf)
I am a teacher now, and the best-loved teachers still raise my antennae for being potential predators. One former friend turned out to be spending his chosen female students' pre-18 years doing the grooming, and waiting for their 18th birthdays to introduce them to D/s games. He was everyone's favorite teacher, holding all night gaming sessions with kids. That was my biggest red flag, but no one seemed to think it was anything but dedication. Fucking creep.
Yes, there are definitely great beloved teachers who know their boundaries. But let me tell you, there are a whole lot of creepers who don't and use it as a cover.
posted by RedEmma at 10:14 AM on September 16, 2016 [1 favorite]
I am a teacher now, and the best-loved teachers still raise my antennae for being potential predators. One former friend turned out to be spending his chosen female students' pre-18 years doing the grooming, and waiting for their 18th birthdays to introduce them to D/s games. He was everyone's favorite teacher, holding all night gaming sessions with kids. That was my biggest red flag, but no one seemed to think it was anything but dedication. Fucking creep.
Yes, there are definitely great beloved teachers who know their boundaries. But let me tell you, there are a whole lot of creepers who don't and use it as a cover.
posted by RedEmma at 10:14 AM on September 16, 2016 [1 favorite]
The fascinating dynamic emerging from all these stories are that seemingly the things that make for great teachers (or well loved teachers, anyway) are also the same things that should rightfully trigger concern. clock punching, boring, automotons who don't see their students as humans are very very unlikely to either cause problems or inspire their students. How do you tell the difference between genuine enthusiasm/commitment/eccentricity and grooming?
My high school guidance counselor, who was also the faculty sponsor of the academic/trivia competition in which I participated, was for meeting with someone he thought to be a 17 year old in a park for the purposes of having sex (spoiler alert: the "17 year old" was a cop).
There is no question that his mentorship (and I think I can call it friendship) were very important to my experience of high school and life as a whole- from the most obvious level of putting it in my head to attend the college that I did, which subsequently led me to meet my spouse etc.
When he was arrested a few years back I had some conversations with classmates (this was generally our first real contact or discussion in several years) and most people said the same thing. On one hand it was hard to believe and there were some signs that perhaps he had been entrapped (and while taking advantage of a 17 year old is clearly illegal in the jurisdiction where it happened, its not totally equitable to say toddlers?) and on the other hand there sure were some serious red flags - he was definitely a loner, perhaps excessively committed to his students, and decidedly more casual and personal than other members of the faculty. There was never any suggestion that he had acted inappropriately on campus or with any students, to the best of my knowledge, and even if that is 100% true, which is unknowable, it is a little disconcerting that the same things that made him such a dynamic force in our lives could have been coming from a place so dark.
I echo other commenters that this article seems to let the teacher off lightly/infantilize a grown man who should have known better, but I also have personal experiences that show where these conflicted feeling can come from when one isn't just some dispassionate observer.
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 10:32 AM on September 16, 2016
My high school guidance counselor, who was also the faculty sponsor of the academic/trivia competition in which I participated, was for meeting with someone he thought to be a 17 year old in a park for the purposes of having sex (spoiler alert: the "17 year old" was a cop).
There is no question that his mentorship (and I think I can call it friendship) were very important to my experience of high school and life as a whole- from the most obvious level of putting it in my head to attend the college that I did, which subsequently led me to meet my spouse etc.
When he was arrested a few years back I had some conversations with classmates (this was generally our first real contact or discussion in several years) and most people said the same thing. On one hand it was hard to believe and there were some signs that perhaps he had been entrapped (and while taking advantage of a 17 year old is clearly illegal in the jurisdiction where it happened, its not totally equitable to say toddlers?) and on the other hand there sure were some serious red flags - he was definitely a loner, perhaps excessively committed to his students, and decidedly more casual and personal than other members of the faculty. There was never any suggestion that he had acted inappropriately on campus or with any students, to the best of my knowledge, and even if that is 100% true, which is unknowable, it is a little disconcerting that the same things that made him such a dynamic force in our lives could have been coming from a place so dark.
I echo other commenters that this article seems to let the teacher off lightly/infantilize a grown man who should have known better, but I also have personal experiences that show where these conflicted feeling can come from when one isn't just some dispassionate observer.
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 10:32 AM on September 16, 2016
errr my second paragraph is missing the crucial word "arrested"
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 10:44 AM on September 16, 2016
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 10:44 AM on September 16, 2016
I guess that I don't think my best high-school teachers were charismatic cool people who treated us like peers. My best high-school teachers were adults who maintained boundaries, and who also seemed to respect me and want me to learn. I actually remember being a little suspicious of the charismatic teachers who wanted to be your friend. I wasn't at all sophisticated enough to realize that they might be predators, but I thought they were kind of bullshit artists who weren't necessarily that invested in whether we learned the material.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 10:53 AM on September 16, 2016 [11 favorites]
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 10:53 AM on September 16, 2016 [11 favorites]
How do you tell the difference between genuine enthusiasm/commitment/eccentricity and grooming?
You can't. That's why there are windows in classroom doors. Why principals and department chairs are allowed to walk into a classroom any time. Why teachers should never be alone with individual students if they can help it, especially outside of normal hours or off campus, and why they shouldn't be giving them rides by themselves. The thing to understand is that human beings are surprisingly capable of doing awful things even when they are genuinely good people, and even when they are your friends.
That's why denial is such a prevalent thing when it comes to sexual predation. We cannot admit that someone we see as a good person might have done something awful. So we deny it, we blame the victim, and we try to protect our young people from strangers -- who are much less often the problem.
Trust, but protect. That's the thing people don't want to do. They want to trust wholeheartedly, because that's what makes us feel it's a good world, so they don't try to protect. Or they want to distrust everyone, and they try to put protection in place that can't protect against the predator inside the inner circle.
posted by Peach at 11:26 AM on September 16, 2016 [11 favorites]
Throughout my childhood and early adolescence I was an aspiring actress. In the middle of my freshman year of high school, my family moved to her hometown, and I enrolled in a public high school with a formidable drama teacher. I was perhaps a little too excited to appear in the spring musical, and my attempts at getting a speaking role were thwarted because I was a freshman (even one-line speaking roles went to seniors) and new to the school.
Unfortunately, said drama teacher decided to make me the center of attention by humiliating me in front of the cast and the other students in the class I took with her. In the class, she had us study and perform monologues, and I'd been assigned a monologue that I learned was about a girl who was buying a bra with her mother. When I asked for another monologue (and offered a few suggestions), she loudly dressed me down in front of the class. (One of the other girls in that class had to give a monologue about a drunk girl contemplating suicide, and she was rude to this girl while "directing" her.) In rehearsals she would scream at me Joan Crawford style for not paying my monetary dues to the drama club (I was from a low-income family, which she knew), screwing up the blocking in rehearsal, and missing a rehearsal due to my great grandmother's stroke. She also conducted long rehearsals on snow days, and many of her rehearsals would devolve into reminiscing about previous, more "professional" productions. The nadir of the production came when she stopped a dress rehearsal of the big musical number and called me to the front of the stage--in front of the cast, crew, orchestra, and parents' organization--and lift my skirt to show her I was wearing the right underwear. I begged her to have this conversation one-on-one offstage, and she refused. Apparently she discussed this incident with her choir students.
A few years after I graduated, she got fired for forcing a middle school student to give a monologue about teen pregnancy. What amazed me was that she had the support of parents, who staged a protest of her termination. She always had a cultish relationship with her favorites, and their parents blindly supported her.
Given the parental involvement, I doubt she had the same relationship with her students that this guy had with his. What I wonder, though is how badly he abused and manipulated his non-favorites, and what kind of stories they have.
posted by pxe2000 at 12:21 PM on September 16, 2016 [3 favorites]
Unfortunately, said drama teacher decided to make me the center of attention by humiliating me in front of the cast and the other students in the class I took with her. In the class, she had us study and perform monologues, and I'd been assigned a monologue that I learned was about a girl who was buying a bra with her mother. When I asked for another monologue (and offered a few suggestions), she loudly dressed me down in front of the class. (One of the other girls in that class had to give a monologue about a drunk girl contemplating suicide, and she was rude to this girl while "directing" her.) In rehearsals she would scream at me Joan Crawford style for not paying my monetary dues to the drama club (I was from a low-income family, which she knew), screwing up the blocking in rehearsal, and missing a rehearsal due to my great grandmother's stroke. She also conducted long rehearsals on snow days, and many of her rehearsals would devolve into reminiscing about previous, more "professional" productions. The nadir of the production came when she stopped a dress rehearsal of the big musical number and called me to the front of the stage--in front of the cast, crew, orchestra, and parents' organization--and lift my skirt to show her I was wearing the right underwear. I begged her to have this conversation one-on-one offstage, and she refused. Apparently she discussed this incident with her choir students.
A few years after I graduated, she got fired for forcing a middle school student to give a monologue about teen pregnancy. What amazed me was that she had the support of parents, who staged a protest of her termination. She always had a cultish relationship with her favorites, and their parents blindly supported her.
Given the parental involvement, I doubt she had the same relationship with her students that this guy had with his. What I wonder, though is how badly he abused and manipulated his non-favorites, and what kind of stories they have.
posted by pxe2000 at 12:21 PM on September 16, 2016 [3 favorites]
My heart dropped when I read the first line.
I thought it was about my widely-beloved high school theater teacher who killed himself this summer (in the school auditorium, no one else was in the building). While investigating his death, the sheriff's department found out that a new-to-the-school teacher that he was good friends with had had sex with two (18 y.o.) students.
And, god, am I scared of hearing that there's more to the story.
posted by Maladroid at 2:09 AM on September 17, 2016 [2 favorites]
I thought it was about my widely-beloved high school theater teacher who killed himself this summer (in the school auditorium, no one else was in the building). While investigating his death, the sheriff's department found out that a new-to-the-school teacher that he was good friends with had had sex with two (18 y.o.) students.
And, god, am I scared of hearing that there's more to the story.
posted by Maladroid at 2:09 AM on September 17, 2016 [2 favorites]
Whenever I happen to meet someone patently charismatic, who spends a lot of time around an adoring kid-fanbase (i.e. if they are a teacher, coach, youth director, etc.), I assume they are sketchy - possibly predatory, even - unless proven otherwise.
I don't like that I feel this way too, but I do. It's true what we always say about the plural of anecdote, but in my life it has with startling and awful frequency turned out to be the case that men who have organized their lives to be around young people most of the time have done so from predatory motives.
It's just popped up too often to be ignored or rationalized away. It was true in my Cub Scout pack, it was true in my weird little hippie free school, and it was true in college. And as a result, I've come to assume the least charitable reading — not merely that this is endemic to our culture now, but that it always has been, and it was so utterly normalized that we never let it disturb the smooth and placid course of events. Ways were found to deal with the occasional pregnancy or suicide, and the beat went on. What I'm grateful for is that we finally seem to be learning how to identify these situations, and maybe even how to circumvent them in the future.
How do you tell the difference between genuine enthusiasm/commitment/eccentricity and grooming?
I'm sure this answer won't be a popular one, but I don't think there often is a distinction — not, anyway, between that kind of "enthusiasm" that manifests itself as plenty of off-duty, unsupervised socializing on the one hand, and grooming on the other. I know it sounds a little Potter Stewart of me, but I think we all have a sense for what that looks and feels like — and as far as I'm concerned, fairly or not, it gives me the howling fantods.
posted by adamgreenfield at 6:48 AM on September 18, 2016 [1 favorite]
I don't like that I feel this way too, but I do. It's true what we always say about the plural of anecdote, but in my life it has with startling and awful frequency turned out to be the case that men who have organized their lives to be around young people most of the time have done so from predatory motives.
It's just popped up too often to be ignored or rationalized away. It was true in my Cub Scout pack, it was true in my weird little hippie free school, and it was true in college. And as a result, I've come to assume the least charitable reading — not merely that this is endemic to our culture now, but that it always has been, and it was so utterly normalized that we never let it disturb the smooth and placid course of events. Ways were found to deal with the occasional pregnancy or suicide, and the beat went on. What I'm grateful for is that we finally seem to be learning how to identify these situations, and maybe even how to circumvent them in the future.
How do you tell the difference between genuine enthusiasm/commitment/eccentricity and grooming?
I'm sure this answer won't be a popular one, but I don't think there often is a distinction — not, anyway, between that kind of "enthusiasm" that manifests itself as plenty of off-duty, unsupervised socializing on the one hand, and grooming on the other. I know it sounds a little Potter Stewart of me, but I think we all have a sense for what that looks and feels like — and as far as I'm concerned, fairly or not, it gives me the howling fantods.
posted by adamgreenfield at 6:48 AM on September 18, 2016 [1 favorite]
I should add that, like many of you, I developed a sixth sense for this behavior relatively early on.
It was completely unsurprising for me to learn, just a few years back, that an administrator that had always given me the creeps had been hounded from town to town over the fifteen years prior to his engagement at my school, fired from one school after another for serial, unspecified inappropriateness.
In those pre-Internet days, it was evidently relatively easy for him to escape detection and present a clean record to prospective employers (though surely there must have been questions about the brieifness of his tenure in each successive position, and I have to wonder about how diligent the due diligence process really was when he was hired at my school).
And yet, what was apparently invisible to the school's board was completely transparent to us kids. I knew it from the moment he chalked a proof that "sex = fun" up onto the board. In an empty classroom, fifteen minutes after the end of the school day. I knew it. Everyone under the age of majority knew it. It was so patently obvious I don't know how it could have escaped anyone's notice. And somehow he kept getting hired, because he had such "good rapport with the students."
posted by adamgreenfield at 7:03 AM on September 18, 2016
It was completely unsurprising for me to learn, just a few years back, that an administrator that had always given me the creeps had been hounded from town to town over the fifteen years prior to his engagement at my school, fired from one school after another for serial, unspecified inappropriateness.
In those pre-Internet days, it was evidently relatively easy for him to escape detection and present a clean record to prospective employers (though surely there must have been questions about the brieifness of his tenure in each successive position, and I have to wonder about how diligent the due diligence process really was when he was hired at my school).
And yet, what was apparently invisible to the school's board was completely transparent to us kids. I knew it from the moment he chalked a proof that "sex = fun" up onto the board. In an empty classroom, fifteen minutes after the end of the school day. I knew it. Everyone under the age of majority knew it. It was so patently obvious I don't know how it could have escaped anyone's notice. And somehow he kept getting hired, because he had such "good rapport with the students."
posted by adamgreenfield at 7:03 AM on September 18, 2016
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The actual charges of sexual assault are a side issue in this article.
What should be central to our understanding of this article's bias is that the kind of behavior that this drama teacher engaged in at Chappaqua High School (a school I have visited) is borderline OK at this rich white high school, whereas at 99% of the high schools in North America this guy would have been dismissed long ago. Why was he allowed to stay? Complicated issues of class and "art" would be central to a full discussion of the answer to this question, a question which the article does not begin to touch.
posted by kozad at 5:27 PM on September 15, 2016 [2 favorites]