If you watch politics right now, you are aware that finding something that Democrats and Republicans can agree on is nothing short of a miracle. When it comes to protecting Indiana students, a miracle is exactly what was needed. Indiana Republican Sen. Aaron Freeman from Beech Grove and House Democratic Rep. Carolyn Jackson from Hammond.
Freeman authored Senate Bill 342 with hopes of closing dangerous loopholes that existed in Indiana’s code specific to teacher misconduct.
At the start of this year’s general assembly it was 100% legal for a teacher to have a substantiated DCS case for abuse and/or neglect, numerous convictions for Class A Misdemeanors, and a history of grooming students at previous schools. Teachers were able to be on active probation and serving incarceration on an intermittent basis. Meaning teachers that had been convicted of criminal offenses and received jail time to be served on weekends and vacations could leave school on Friday, check themselves into jail for the weekend, then leave jail and walk back into their classrooms full of vulnerable and unknowing students on Monday morning.
Due to employment laws and DCS confidentiality measures, criminals were able to hide behind laws that were meant to protect law-abiding teachers and vulnerable children. As advocate Ashley Nation shared, “Human Resources protect adults, they don’t protect children. In my case, one of my old teachers who...
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