It happens in middle schools and high schools across the community. In hallways. In classrooms. On the bus.
Students, mostly girls, sexually harassed by peers. Sometimes it stops at name-calling — girls being called a "slut" or a "ho."
But it often escalates. During the 2007-09 school years in Tucson:
• At Palo Verde High School, a student called her mother from the girls' restroom after a boy in her class repeatedly asked if he could penetrate her with his finger, and then persisted in touching her leg, higher and higher. The boy, who ultimately was suspended, said he was just playing around.
• At Apollo Middle School, a boy touched a girl's crotch and chest over and over in class and after school. The boy, who was suspended, told school officials that it was just a game he was playing with another boy in class.
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• A Chaparral Middle School student poked a girl in the nipple while walking in from lunch. When asked about it, he said he did it, but "I didn't think it would be a big deal." He was suspended.
• At Challenger Middle School, a boy grabbed a girl by the hair during class and demanded oral sex. He said he'd been egged on by another boy. Also at Challenger, a campus monitor saw a boy slap a girl on the behind during lunch. The boy said it was part of a game called "slap-ass Friday." Both boys were suspended.
• At Vail Middle School, a girl reported that a boy had been touching her inappropriately on campus. When confronted, the student said he was "horny." He was suspended.
Statistical perspectives
A database of 3,529 crimes on Tucson Unified School District campuses in the last school year shows that school officers responded to 77 sexual-related incidents. Not included in the database created by the Arizona Daily Star were another 74 cases of sexual misconduct on school buses.
There were 46 student referrals for sexual harassment in the Sunnyside Unified School District out of 1,977 referrals for campus violations.
The Vail School District reported 15 cases of sexual harassment, while the Catalina Foothills School District reported six, ranging from sexual harassment to indecent exposure at its campuses. Other districts did not break out sexual harassment cases.
Many students interviewed about sexual harassment on campus said they believe incidents are underreported.
"Some girls have low self-esteem and are embarrassed to say anything or to stand up for someone else," said Renee Valencia, 17.
Vanessa Gonzales, 17, the former manager of junior varsity and varsity volleyball teams, said sometimes it's best to ignore it. "Because if you tell them anything, then it just leads to them calling you a bitch and others giving you a hard time," she said.
She said athletes often feel uncomfortable practicing in their spandex shorts because of jeering remarks made by boys. "These things should not even be an issue, but guys are just being ignorant and stupid."
Problems can begin early
Sexual harassment at school happens at surprisingly young ages. A case of student-to-student sexual harassment was reported last year at Sunrise Drive Elementary School, in the Catalina Foothills district, and school officers responded to several elementary schools in TUSD for sex-related offenses. In Vail, there were more reports of sexual harassment at middle schools than at high schools.
A 1993 report, "Hostile Hallways," conducted with funding from the American Association of University Women, surveyed more than 1,600 students in the eighth through 11th grades and found 83 percent of girls reported experiencing sexual harassment in their public schools, with 30 percent describing such behaviors as happening "often."
More recently, researchers from the University of Southern Maine published a study in the journal Sex Roles in July 2008. It indicated 35 percent of 522 students ages 11 to 18 reported they had experienced some form of sexual harassment.
"We have a lot of sexual violence going on in school, and it's happening at younger and younger ages," said Nan Stein, a senior research scientist at the Wellesley Centers for Women. Stein specializes in the subject and has written a book on it. "It impedes equity in school, and it impedes achievement. If you're worried about being sexually assaulted in school, you're not going to be thinking too much about your coursework."
The incident reports reviewed by the Star include descriptions of local students caught "sexting" — sending sexually explicit text messages or photos — to each other over their cell phones. A girl told school officials that she had been having sex with her 30-year-old uncle. Another reported she'd been raped at a birthday party over winter break. There also were the occasional reports of consensual sex between students, behind the bleachers or in restrooms.
But the bulk of the reports provide a glimpse into a world in which teens are blowing past the bounds of appropriate interaction.
"Guys believe you can't harass the willing," said 17-year-old Carlos Gálvez, a senior at Sunnyside High School. "When guys are going through puberty, sex is on the mind all the time. Some guys will cop a feel. Some can't control it. They are immature. But most will grow out of it," he said, acknowledging that young men do not have the right to touch a girl because of their hormonal urges.
Budgetary constraints
School harassment is tough to combat when schools are cutting back on costs.
Local law-enforcement agencies have pulled officers out of schools in the face of budget challenges. TUSD, the largest district in the Tucson area, with 105 schools, has nine school safety officers assigned to high schools.
No officers are assigned to middle schools — a problem because it's in middle school when much of the bad behavior starts. That's also when parents start pulling their kids from TUSD's public schools, too, because of safety concerns.
And while most schools have campus monitors, their ranks were thinned, along with counselors, when schools had to cut 14 percent of their budgets.
"We would prefer to have a presence in the middle schools, and we would prefer to have the staff that would allow us to be more proactive," said Bud Waters, the commander of the TUSD school safety department. With his staff handling 40 phone calls every day, he said, heading off harassment and other types of misbehavior often falls to administrators.
Jim Fish, TUSD assistant superintendent for middle schools, has told all of his principals to take a preventive approach to sexual harassment.
"You need to sit down with kids and be clear about what is acceptable and what is not," he said. "We make too many assumptions about what kids should know."
A principal for 21 years at middle and high schools, Fish said big assemblies weren't effective. The kids laughed. Or they wouldn't ask questions. But in small groups, a dialogue would start.
Kids would tell him: "You're from a different generation. Girls don't mind. They know we're just playing." Fish said they start coming around when he asks whether it would be OK if he patted them on the rear. They usually answer that he doesn't have the right to touch them —and that's a starting point for a conversation.
They're tough conversations to have, he said. "As adults, we're afraid to talk about these topics with kids because they're sensitive topics. But I think parents expect administrators to have these kinds of discussions."
At Sunnyside, there are two roving security teams for the district at night, campus security monitors at all schools and one off-duty police officer at each high school.
Principal Raúl Nido, whose campus has 2,330 students, said sexual harassment has been covered in assemblies and classes for more than a decade. The same happens at the middle and elementary schools, along with family counseling.
Students applauded a skit performed last spring by teens from another high school, a skit that dealt with inappropriate touching, sexual harassment and abstinence. But they were unimpressed with what they described as a "lame and outdated" video on sexual harassment.
"It looks like it was put together in the 1980s," said Alejandro Estrella, 18. It usually doesn't lead to a discussion, either, he said. "There are some teachers who don't discuss the topic with us after we see the video. They turn it on and leave the room. Not all teachers feel comfortable talking with us about sexual harassment."
Cultural impact
Wellesley researcher Stein is convinced that sexual harassment in school is on an upswing, but she said the reasons for that are unclear.
With the emphasis on high- stakes testing and with fewer adults on campuses because of budget cuts, she said, there may be less time to teach appropriate social interaction or answer questions about adolescent development.
And, she said, kids see it in the larger culture. At sporting events, players often do a quick bum-pat as a nonverbal expression of "good job." "They've seen this behavior as being very acceptable," she said.
In hip-hop artist Nelly's "Tip Drill," the singer swipes his credit card between a woman's buttocks. In a moment of life imitating art, a boy at Sunnyside High School got in trouble for harassing a girl as she walked home. He grabbed her ID card from her book bag and told her she'd have to give him oral sex if she wanted it back. Then he slid the card down her rear.
"Everything is so sexualized now that it's hard for kids not to pick up on it," said Susan Fineran, who co-wrote the report that ran in Sex Roles.
Schools are federally mandated to immediately act to curtail sexual harassment, backed up by a 1999 U.S. Supreme Court decision stemming from the case of a fifth-grader who was harassed for months by a classmate who made vulgar statements to her, rubbed his body against hers and attempted to touch her breasts and genital area. As teachers failed to take action, the girl's once-high grades plummeted, and she contemplated suicide.
The court determined there is a private right to education and that damages can be brought against schools that act with deliberate indifference when victims are kept from exercising their right to an education.
Boys can be targets, too
Sunnyside High School counselor Sylvia Loustaunau said she believes sexual harassment is underreported among boys, also.
The "Hostile Hallways" study backs her up, noting that as many as 79 percent of boys reported being harassed at some point. Loustaunau said boys often give each other "purple nipples," which is grabbing a nipple and twisting it.
In May at Challenger Middle School, a boy was warned against grabbing what a victim called his "man breasts."
In November at Cholla Magnet High School, a student slipped his hands under another male's shorts and tried to grab his testicles.
TV talk-show host Oprah Winfrey recently featured the families of three middle school boys who had killed themselves after being the victims of harassment. All three had been called "gay" and taunted mercilessly by classmates. The parents talked on the show about how they'd felt helpless to stop it.
Fineran said the parents didn't know the lingo. If they'd told the schools that the boys were being sexually harassed, the schools would have had to take immediate steps to address it. "Schools called it bullying and not sexual harassment, and we have three dead kids now. That's a tragedy to me," she said.
Loustaunau said she tells students to speak up for themselves.
"For some, it may take awhile to build the confidence to do it, even among the outspoken students. Sexual harassment can scare a person and make them feel small. It can be so insidious," said Loustaunau, who put together a PowerPoint presentation for freshmen using scenarios students say happened to them on campus.
Manuel L. Díaz, Sunnyside High campus security monitor, has worked for the district for 17 years. He said students need to realize that sexual harassment is serious. "I do see a lack of respect on both the parts of gentlemen and women toward each other," he said. "All of us need to work on this."
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