The sex offender registry failed them: Students abused by school counselors despite tool.

According to the American School Counselor Association, “School counselors are a key link in the child abuse prevention network. School counselors are responsible for reporting suspected cases of child abuse or neglect to the proper authorities. School counselors must be able to guide and assist abused and neglected students by providing appropriate services. School counselors are committed to providing high-quality services, with research-based intervention techniques, to children who are victims of abuse and neglect.”

Often times, school counselors are the trusted authority figure children go to when being victimized, but in some cases the counselors are the perpetrators. This past week that was the case in West Virginia, where an elementary school counselor was sentenced to 25 years for posing as a teenage boy in order to solicit sexual images and videos from children. That was also the case in Missouri, where a high school counselor was sentenced to 15 years for grooming and abusing students. But how?

More than most, school administrators should be using the sex offender registry in order to prevent these individuals from harming students. Also, many municipalities have set up residency restrictions designed to prevent these individuals from living within hundreds or even thousands of feet of schools. Yet despite the publicly available registry and exclusion zones, somehow the registry failed students in West Virginia, Missouri (and that’s just a sampling from one week). How many people who are actually on the registry in West Virginia or Missouri have sexually assaulted a student last week? Last month? Last year?

Perhaps it’s time we come up with solutions that will actually protect our students and not just give families a false sense of security.