Bureaucrats at my university are forcing the faculty members (and when I say forcing, I mean they threaten all faculty members with being fired on the spot in spite of our contracts and tenure) to sign a document in which we promise that from now on we will report all acts of child molestation and abuse that come to our attention. To ensure that we do report child abuse, we are given the official title of “Mandatory Reporter.”
I guess the implication is that idiots like us would just sit by and let pedophiles molest children in peace unless the authorities inform us that raping kids is wrong. We are probably supposed to read this document and exclaim, “Ah! Finally I know that something needs to be done about my neighbor brutalizing little Billy! Thank you, dear Big Brother and Sister, for letting me know that child rape is not a cool thing to do!”
The State of Illinois where I live and work is drowning in debt. Essential public services are being cut. Yet there is money enough to keep on the state payroll a bunch of idiot bureaucrats who come up with hugely important initiatives to inform college professors that child abuse is wrong.
I have a feeling we will soon have a bureaucrat placed in every bathroom on campus who well get us to sign paperwork confirming that we did wash our hands every time after using the facilities.
Seriously, people, I understand that the state has to find jobs for this bunch of brainless idiots and bureaucratic positions are the only place where they can practice their extreme idiocy freely, but does this have to be done at the expense of insulting a big group of employees who actually do important and useful work?
Clarissa's Blog 
Your administrators are simply setting up as much protection as they can against the university being sued for high demages in such cases. Faculty are agents of the university and if they fail to report – well you saw what happened at Penn State.
Their request is entirely understandable in a a witch-hunting environment.
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I don’t get it, though, because all of our students are adults. We don’t even get to see any children at work.
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?? There are always a few students who are 16 or 17 years old. I was 17 when I started undergrad school.
State law can make anyone a ‘mandated reporter.’ Signing a form is not necessary.
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Well this is all because of Pen State where coaches (not faculty but still staff) were aware of rapes and didn’t report them. So now everyone is worried about getting sued and about abuse on campuses….. We have the “Mandatory Reporter” thing too now. But it extends to everybody on campus–not just minors or students. So if I am aware that an adminstrator is abusing a faculty member, I have to report it for instance……………I undersand your anger. But at the same time, I think many people “look the other way” with abuse. Maybe this will help stop that tendancy. And if stops even one instance of abuse, I guess it might be worth it. I understand why you feel insulted though. It’s a strange system.
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I don’t think that those who look the other way do so because they haven’t been given a paper to sign.
Also, we were threatened with being fired on the spot in a highly insulting letter. How is that not abusive? These people who think nothing of engaging in abusive practices of this kind presume to lecture me on abuse. I’m outraged. I don’t care about their issues with being sued. That is their problem and they are turning it into mine.
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And I still don’t understand what this has to do with child abuse since our students are adults. Faculty members are not even allowed to pass by the campus with their children. There are no children. Why are we signing letters about child abuse?
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Does your university not have child creches on or near to the campus for the children of faculty and students? Most universities do so. Does it not rent out its buildings for school events, circuses, etc. ?
Actually, a major successful law suit against the university might impact you, by forcing the institution to release faculty for financial reasons. Usually, tenure does not protect against financial stringency. And surely tenure-track positions would be at risk.
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It’s all rather suspicious to me. Can you be accused of witnessing an event, even if you didn’t? Do you have to report hearsay? Because nobody can do anything on just hearsay–there’s no legality in that.
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If I had even a slightest suspicion that anybody was abusing a child, I would hound the police to investigate. We all know how I feel about child abuse, I hope. But the idea that somebody believes they have the moral authority to remind me that child abuse is wrong is very offensive. Why am I suspected of being a horrible person? What have I done to merit this suspicion? Becoming a college professor?
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Ah yes, and we of Lincolnland also have <a href="http://phytophactor.fieldofscience.com/2012/10/ethics-training.html".mandatory ethics training which doesn’t say a thing about child abuse. And please understand that it has been my role to yammer away about the wretched excesses of working for this state and trampeling upon someone else’s blog turf might be considered unethical if there weren’t so much silliness to go around, so much wasted time, so much wasted money. So welcome to the club. 😉
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Ooops, typed the hyperlink incorrectly.
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It’s state law that all employees at state universities in Illinois are mandatory reporters. You called that one right!
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A result of the Penn State hysteria…
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To be associated with football coaches is grossly ridiculous and insulting. It takes bureaucratic ignoramuses to vomit that kind of shit.
Always remember that austerity measures are in fact authority measures…
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Another question, what kind of child molestation could be done in a college like this…
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Another question, what kind of child molestation could be done in a college like this????
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I used to work in the Editorial Department of the University of South Africa (it’s a distance education university, and our main job was to try to put the ramblings of lecturers into language that students could understand).
One day the university bureaucrats decreed that we had to give up a day’s work to listen to the wafflings of a “task team” who told us that their task was to “facilitate conflict”.
Any sane human being might think that it would be good to resolve conflict, to reduce conflict, or to eliminate it. But no, the university was spending money for this bunch of idiots to facilitate conflict.
They wondered why we kept giggling and sniggering.
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Oh, bureaucrat-speak is priceless.
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Hey, it could be worse. I mean you didn’t have to promise to never molest someone, did you? At least your much-hated administrators don’t think you need that to, you know, not molest anyone.
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I haven’t seen this year’s ethics training. Who knows what it will say?
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Speaking of ethics training, how about a NY university dean who forced a student to be her personal maid and cook in order to keep her scholarship? Student abuse.
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/st-john-student-dean-made-hand-wash-underwear-article-1.1183981
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