The Baldy Center Podcast

The Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy at the University at Buffalo
Spring 2023, Episode 31
Podcast recording date: 12/16/2023
Host-producer: Simon Honig
Speaker: Claire Cameron
Contact information: BaldyCenter@buffalo.edu

Simon:

Welcome to the Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy Podcast. I'm your host, Simon Honig. Today I'm joined by Dr. Claire Cameron, an Associate Professor of Learning and Instruction at the University of Buffalo Graduate School of Education. Dr. Cameron is an educational psychologist with areas of expertise in early childhood education, childhood development, educational psychology, and classroom management. She also leads a research team at UB called The Science of Public Engagement and Communication. Welcome Dr. Claire Cameron. Thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate your time.

Claire:

Thank you for having me. I do want to start with an intro statement, which is to just acknowledge how difficult it is to talk about abuse, sexual abuse within that bigger category of abuse is the hardest to discuss. And that's part of why we need conversations like this and Erin's law and more exposure to and comfort with talking about these difficult things.

Simon:

My first question for you is, what experience or knowledge do you have of the prevalence of child sex abuse in schools?

Claire:

Okay. The Associated Press did an investigation of criminal reports that were filed. So over a four-year period from 2011 to 2015, there were about 17,000 official reports of sexual assault occurring at school. So on average, that's more than 4,000 per year. In any discussion of those statistics, we have to always realize that what's actually going on is a much higher number, because things don't always get reported. So as far as what's happening or who's involved. So for every adult on-child sexual attack that was reported on school property, there were actually seven assaults by peers. So when we think about child sex abuse in schools, it's really peer-on-peer violence, and the largest number of incidents are happening with victims being 14 and 15 years old. For children under age 10, we're looking at fewer than a hundred in incidents per year. So for the youngest children in the data set, five and six-year-olds represent 5% of that total number. And then when we're looking at the group's most affected 14 and 15-year-olds, we're looking at 600 incidents per year on average. Again, that's the lowest possible number because of the amount of underreporting.

Simon:

So you being an expert in, you know, early childhood education and development, can you speak to maybe how that trauma would appear in a child's behavior?

Claire:

Yeah, so let's talk about trauma for a second. Trauma can be acute. So a car accident, a single incident of violence or sexual assault. Trauma can be ongoing as with bullying or ongoing sexual abuse. And what our bodies do when we're in these situations is we go into a defensive survival state, and people are different. Some people have a tendency to withdraw. For young children, the youngest children, they're going to be most likely to withdraw both to survive the situation, but in other settings. So withdrawn, children may not make eye contact. They might stop speaking or start communicating very little. They might have stomach aches. These are the children that you interact with, and you just think they're someplace else. And those symptoms that I talked about, those behaviors of not making eye contact or, or withdrawing as we refer to in the developmental world as internalizing. So we're taking this horrific event that's happened, and we're dealing with it by going inward. Another way, a very common way that we see children coping with trauma is what we call externalizing. So in that category, we see a lot of acting out. We see outbursts. We might see violence from the children. And in learning about how sexual abuse manifests for children, it's what we want to train teachers and parents to look for is sudden changes in children's behavior. So if a child's behavior changes, suddenly, if they were bubbly and chatty and all of a sudden, they get very shy and won't answer questions or respond, that's a signal that something may be going on. It manifests differently depending on the child, depending on the situation. But, however it manifests, trauma resulting from sexual abuse, creates a lot of shame. And shame is a state that cuts us off from the world. Children feel there's something wrong with them. They somehow deserve what's happened to them. They did something to bring it upon themselves, and the child loses a sense of safety or ability to focus and engage in what's maybe happening in the classroom. And that's because when we're in these defensive nervous system states, whether we're in shutdown or fight or flight or high anxiety, that's the goal, is to keep us alive. And it's really not an ideal state to learn in. You can't really learn when you're defending yourself.

Simon:

Speaking of, you mentioned, training the teachers and the adults in these children's lives. Have you seen or sought to implement any sort of curricula on this issue in your work? Or have you, you know, what have you seen surrounding this particular problem?

Claire:

Yeah, so I direct the early childhood and childhood master's programs, which leads to certification for our future teachers to teach from birth to grade six. So before being certified to teach by New York State, our students have to complete the Dignity for All: Students Act Training, which is six clock hours. And that's pertaining to prevention, intervention in harassment, bullying, and discrimination. I haven't done the training myself. I don't know the degree to which it includes information about sexual abuse, specifically. I do teach for these students in teacher education a course in the spring called Agencies and Services for Children. This is a required course, and we hear from a lot of different community partners. Usually students invite, find and invite community partners. However, at the front end of the class, we always visit, as part of what I arrange, we visit the Child Advocacy Center. And the Child Advocacy Center, I don't know if that's come up in other conversations pertaining to this issue, but child advocacy centers are located across the country, and the center is designed to process sexual and physical abuse cases in a child centered way that allows for the least amount of re-traumatization for the child. So there's the initial traumatic experience of abuse, but what ends up happening a lot of the time is the child is telling the teacher and then the principal, and then a nurse, and then a detective, and they're having to tell their story multiple times. So the Child Advocacy Center enables a single interview or minimal numbers of interviews that are confidentially recorded. So, in any case, I bring my teachers to the Child Advocacy Center. We spend about two hours there touring the space. There's a medical examination room. There's a lot of child friendly spaces. And the center also offers follow-up trainings and certifications pertaining to teachers’ mandatory reporter status. So this is a big resource that I want to advertise, get more information out there about, because they do have, I believe, online offerings as well.

Simon:

In, you know, the requirements in the model statute for Erin's law, the Child Sexual Abuse Prevention Program goes from grades pre-K through 12, and it trains school personnel and parents are supposed to be included in this training. Now, it's easy to see that a prevention program like this could be, you know, taught in a school setting, which would mean, you know, that the students and training school personnel teachers are already included. But why is it, in your opinion, so valuable for parents to be included on this kind of training?

Claire:

So more than 90% of sexual abuse is perpetrated by people known to the child. That includes family members and relatives. They may or may not be staying in the home with the child, neighbors. So parents, and when I say parents, I include guardians and caregivers. Parents are in the best position to know who their child is around outside of the school time and to directly intervene if necessary. So especially for younger children. So for younger children, their world is home and school. And as children develop and head toward middle school, the typical child starts to spend more time around peers, more time outside of the home after school. So it does depend on the age of the child, but in general, until they leave the home, parents are the ones who know what their child is doing and who they're spending time with.

And this is anecdotal, I don't have the data on this, but I do also recall from visits to the Child Advocacy Center. What they tell us is that often the perpetrator of sexual abuse is a boyfriend or a stepfather that mom is dating, and there may be violence in the relationship, or codependence. Parents may want to avoid the problem. They might want to minimize it. Whether or not it's somebody they're romantically involved with, it's really hard to hear information that somebody you're related to is harming your child. But if we don't empower parents with information about what's appropriate and what's sexual abuse, we really can't expect them to be able to act in an informed way. So it's also important for important for parents to become educated about what constitutes sexual abuse or what constitutes inappropriate sexual behavior. Some families might think some behaviors are just teasing, or even normal, maybe they experienced similar things. So they need to know that certain behaviors are damaging and constitute abuse.

Simon:

Yeah, I think there's certainly an element of a generational difference in, you know, what behavior is accepted and what's not.

Claire:

But I think we should make some room to talk about what grooming is.

Simon:

Sure.

Claire:

Because grooming is a topic that is required to be covered by Erin's law, and it's the process by which an abuser slowly acclimates the child and gets them used to certain types of interactions and then escalates. So maybe an initial grooming request is, here's a cookie, shh don't tell Mom, I gave it to you. It's our secret. And then, over time, what's being kept a secret becomes more and more severe. Another example is, I'm going start off, where we have a friendly, fun relationship. I'm going to tickle you. That may go on for a while. Now I'm tickling you under your clothes. Right? So the child initially might not even notice that a behavior is a little off. It might not seem off. Maybe they have other people that do the same behaviors, but over time their behaviors escalate and gets worse. But the child has been going along with it. And that's where children then come to feel that they've brought it on themselves. Like, well I said yes to keeping the cookie a secret, so it must be okay to keep this touching a secret. And just creates a lot of confusion. And again, kind of the feeling of responsibility on the part of the child, and so educating families about the grooming process, with what it looks like, the fact that it may include behaviors that seem appropriate, but it's part of a bigger process of getting the child basically used to abuse and used to keeping it a secret. We need to educate parents about that very harmful process.

Simon:

And that helps me lead into my next question. So you pointed out grooming and that, you know, that may not be covered as much as the actual acts of sexual abuse. Are there any other strengths that you can point out that you've seen in Erin's law or any weaknesses that you think could be covered in a more robust manner?

Claire:

Sure. Well, what I appreciate the most about the law is it takes a systemic approach. It, the law involves all the major stakeholders, the school system, teachers as mandatory reporters, and children themselves. So starting with the school as a system, we can reach millions and millions of children. We can make sure that teachers know what warning signs are. It's really important. I wanted to spend some time here, as teachers get educated about what it looks like when a child has undergone trauma, they can realize that this child acting out or suddenly not speaking to them anymore. It's not a quote unquote behavior problem. It's not something the child is doing to, you know, cause stress to the teacher personally. So understanding that all behavior is communication, and if children communicate, you know, they don't always tell us with words, but they may tell us with their behavior that something is going on and I need your help. That's a really important piece of this is, appropriate teacher education. Finally, Erin's law strives to ensure, ensure that all children receive information about what sexual abuse is and what to do if they experience it. And I love this part of it because it empowers children to protect themselves. So I take this approach in the class I referred to as well. I stress that teachers shouldn't be in the profession to quote unquote save children or, you know, help the child who has a lot of challenges in their life. Nobody needs pity. Children don't need to be pitied. They need our care, commitment, and respect. So I coach my teachers, and I see this law as trying to help teachers be equipped so that they can guide children to resources and teach them what they need, teach them behaviors and responses that they need to navigate in the world, and to also be able to change their own world. Finally, parents being involved, as we've talked about, parents are the ones who know their children's lives and a weakness of the law, when states allow parents to opt out of having their child receive the information that the school is providing. And another weakness is in New York state only children in grades K to 8 are being exposed to the information, whereas the law as it was written, stipulates that children pre-K through grade 12 are getting access to this information.

Simon:

I was going to say, adding onto the weaknesses of the New York State statute. I want to note as well that the specific objectives of the program aren't actually communicated in the statute, and it leaves that information outside of the law, kind of each curriculum could be a little different, and they're also going to be non-binding because they're not in the state statute. How do you think that can affect the program, whether it be…

Claire: Yeah.

Simon:

…in the disparity, you know, of what one child learns to another, that could be across a different district, or a different county?

Claire:

Yeah. More specific requirements about the content is going to be better for children. Because what's going to happen is the leaders or the teachers who are required to implement, who do not feel comfortable with this content may end up choosing activities or material that's confusing or vague or really doesn't communicate what the law intends, which is that we learn what sexual abuse is and what children should do if they're experiencing it. So that just creates, within spaces where people may not be comfortable with the information, it just perpetuates the stigma and shame and lack of capacity to talk about these things, which is part of reducing sexual abuse is being able, we have to start by being able, to talk about it. So in thinking about how could implement this more effectively there's a big cultural, and I say cultural as far as like this culture of schools and our culture of, you know, what's acceptable to talk about in our society, we need to work on reducing stigma around discussing sex, sex parts, and sexual abuse. We want to be in a place where parents are demanding from schools that they be part of teaching children how to keep them safe. So school is not just a place for learning academic topics. We need as a society to take responsibility for teaching children how to care for themselves and care for others. And one of the resources I found emphasized the capacities of empathy and emotion regulation specifically. So when we teach emotion regulation, what we're teaching is, children and adults, we all need to get better at recognizing how we feel when certain things are happening to us. And when we increase those capacities to tolerate information that makes us uncomfortable, or when we can teach children, you know, if something happens to you and you start to feel this nervous feeling like you need to get away, this is what that means. Emotion regulation as a capacity can help us just be more aware of what we need to be safe and what we need to do to keep others safe.

Simon:

You mentioned making, you know, kind of destigmatizing and making that topic easier to talk about and hoping that children can be more communicative about these issues. In New York State, as you mentioned, the statute does not include grades 9 through 12. It stops at grade 8. And it kind of seems to me that as children get older and get into those high school ages, that those are times when they may become more comfortable to talk about those things. So how much of a loss do you think it is that those grades don't get that specific kind of training in New York State?

Claire:

Yeah, it's a missed opportunity, and it's also, that's a kind of generic way to talk about what it means to, you know, not have this content about sexual abuse for high schoolers. It could also be devastating for an individual child who maybe they've been bullied in 8th grade and then they head to high school and it's getting worse. That was one of the cases highlighted when I did research for this interview. So if we have a place where these things are discussed, yes, it's hard. Yes, teens are going to giggle and cross their arms and try to get out of it, but if as adults we don't model the ability to talk about sex and what's safe, appropriate, and healthy sexual behavior, how can we possibly expect our young people to learn these things? And then the other group I think about are children who enter the public school system after being in a private charter or homeschool situation, or who moved to New York State from a different state where Erin's law is being implemented even less well. So there's maybe the state's assuming like, well, they got it from K to 8, so they should know what they need to know by grade nine, but we have to think about who's left out if we don't include the 9 to 12 content. And we also have to think about who is most vulnerable in what they need.

Simon:

Yeah, I was just thinking about, I don't exactly know what grades sex education courses are required in schools, but I'm thinking, you know, more in those, in those high school years when there's health classes and those sexual education classes, that those classes can kind of preliminarily begin to, obviously it should be preliminarily because, you know, these courses should be starting Pre-K and kindergarten. But in those courses which talk about sex parts and making that conversation more open, if those classes are only mandated in high school at the same time where an Erin’s law type of program is not mandated that seems like they kind of contradict each other.

Claire:

Yeah. Well, I'm shocked, but the Sex Education Collaborative page on New York State, the first sentence is New York schools are not required to teach sex ed. However, HIV AIDS instruction is required. Their curriculum must stress abstinence. Let's be realistic, young people engage in sexual behavior. Okay? So this is also very disturbing. The curriculum is not required to include instruction on consent. So we're not teaching young people what it means to say yes or say no to a particular type of interaction. So yeah, this is problematic, but also in a state where sex education is not required, it’s not surprising that there'd be also some discomfort with requiring the material that's in Erin's law. I do want to talk about something else that my students and I learn at the Child Advocacy Center, which is that children should be taught to use the medical terms for body parts, because that is an example of then if somebody touches those parts, they're empowered with the ability to know what is happening and to know that it's not okay for those parts to be touched, except, you know, by a doctor or a nurse or when you're taking a bath, if you need parents help taking a bath, certain situations. Because in some families, sex parts are given idiosyncratic names, goofy names. They might be given names that are actually, don't mean anything to somebody outside of the family, which makes it harder for a child to then communicate about what's happening.

Simon:

Yeah, absolutely. To kind of bring everything together. We did, you know, speak a little bit about what you perceive to be kind of the weaknesses of Erin's law and in New York specifically. So I'm curious, suggestions you would make to implement the law more effectively?

Claire:

Yeah, no, I think we have talked about these. So the big one is that cultural need to reduce stigma about discussing sex, sex parts, and sexual abuse. Part of that's recognizing that it's not just children who are possible victims of abuse, many adults in the world were victims of abuse. It may be unprocessed. It might be that having some type of treatment or therapy or ability to talk about that abuse is going to bring that person to a healthier place. So this is not just about making the world safer for children. This is about making our society a place where people can heal from whatever traumas they've experienced. We've also talked about broadening the law in New York state to include pre-K in grade 9 to 12 to really make it pre-K to 12 as it was intended. And the third, would be eliminating the parents' ability to opt out. I think we have to be realistic though and recognize that some parents are just not going be comfortable with this. They may seek another school. They might not send their children to school on days when this is happening. So that's part of the process, right? But we have to set a goal, which is that we reach as many children as possible with this information. And, you know, I also want to talk about if the law eliminates parents' ability to opt out, it might be wise to pair it with, here's why this is so important. Did you know the statistics on child sexual abuse? By the way, many adults today were themselves abused, maybe making resources available for families and parents if they need them. Creating, this is maybe less in the law, but more in my world, which is how do we work effectively in systems with the different stakeholders? I think it's important that we not make families who may be uncomfortable with this information being shared with their children. We don't want to create and us and them situation, right? This is the type of conversation that you need to invite people into in a very thoughtful way. And so, as part of implementing the curriculum, schools have to have resources to effectively communicate about why they're doing this curriculum. Sharing Erin's story, you know, she's a survivor who's nationally prominent and able to share her story of healing. That could be a powerful way to help families understand the importance of Erin's law and implementing it as it's intended.

Simon:

All right. Well, thank you so much for your time. I really, really appreciate it.

Claire:

You are very welcome. It was an interesting conversation, important to have.

Simon:

You just heard an interview with Dr. Claire Cameron, an Associate Professor of Learning and Instruction at the University of Buffalo Graduate School of Education. This has been the Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy Podcast produced at the University at Buffalo. And you can learn more about the center on our website, buffalo.edu/Baldy Center. If you would like to share your thoughts on this podcast, tweet us at Baldy Center or send us an email at Baldycenter@buffalo.edu. I'm your host, Simon Honig. Thanks for listening.