In 1962, states began to develop legislation to help combat child abuse and neglect. In 1974, the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) was enacted, and the National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect was founded. The center developed the Model Child Protection Act, which is used extensively in state legislation. Minimum standards for what constitutes child abuse and neglect are defined in federal law, and the standard of what constitutes abuse is further stipulated in each state’s statute. This website also describes the statute of limitations, hotline numbers and other important information, such as the penalty for failure to report.
Each year, thousands of abused children come through the halls of our schools and interact with other students, teachers and school counselors. Many remain undetected, silent victims. School counselors, using their observational skills and ability to deliver professional development, can help all educators hone their detection skills.
This column has dealt with child abuse reporting on a number of occasions. However, like most issues we face, new challenges surface on a regular basis. The cases presented here are some of the recent questions ASCA has received.
Alerting the Alleged Abuser
Usually after reporting suspected child abuse, you immediately call the parents to tell them you had to file a report. You adamantly defend this process, because in many of your cases you have been able to maintain the parents’ trust and you are able to continue a relationship with the parents. Is this good practice?
In Cuff v. Grossmont Union High School Dist. (2013), a noncustodial father alerted the school counselor that his sons’ mother was physically and verbally abusing them. The school counselor reported the accusation in a fax to CPS, gave the father a copy of the report and told him to take it to the police so his sons could be taken into custody. The mother subsequently sued the school district and school counselor for invasion of her privacy under California Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Act (CANRA). Under CANRA, any conversation about making the report or the contents of the report is a problem. The report should only be shared with appropriate law enforcement and child protection agencies. The lower court dismissed claims against the school counselor and district. However, on appeal the appellant court held that the school counselor and the district could be liable for violating CANRA’s confidentiality provisions. The court said governmental immunity does not immunize a mandated reporter’s conduct that doesn’t comply with the CANRA’s confidentiality provisions.
In a more recent case in 2017, a school counselor made a CPS report against his fellow educator for sexual abuse of a student. The reporting school counselor shared the details of his CPS report with the other school counselors in the building. School counselors share their child abuse reports all the time with their administrators, and this rarely creates a problem. The difference in this case was that the district didn’t see any compelling reason to start involving others in this highly sensitive matter when the correct players (CPS, the principal and the district) had been notified. The school counselor received a letter of reprimand in his file and spent some uncomfortable months with the threat of termination hanging over his head.
Parents Demand to See Child Abuse Report
Parents are demanding a copy of a report you made accusing them of child abuse. Must you give them a copy?
FERPA and CAPTA both apply to this case, but CAPTA supersedes FERPA so responsibilities under CAPTA and state law will be at issue. The school counselor in question wouldn’t release the report to the parents unless legal proceedings or the district’s legal department required it. Child abuse records are protected to be outside of FERPA. In rare cases, such as a court order, a federal, state or local government entity might require it for the greater good and the child’s protection.
CAPTA’s confidentiality provision requires states to have a law or operate a statewide program that includes methods to preserve the confidentiality of all child abuse and neglect records and reports and provides for exceptions in certain circumstances. The statutory language states that such records shall only be made available to a specified list of persons and entities. Most states have language protecting reports from the abusers.
A principal, teacher, special educator and school counselor all pled “no contest” to failure to report child abuse and were sentenced to probation, fines and community service. The evidence against the educators included two years of email exchanges showing a 12-year-old student’s safety and well-being was a topic of conversation among them as they expressed multiple concerns. The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) investigated in the middle of the two-year period but didn’t substantiate abuse. The educators were still discussing concerns including weight loss following this investigation but didn’t reach back out to DHHS. In August 2016, the student ran away from home and was found bruised, dehydrated, substantially underweight for his age, with a cut lip and old cigarette burns. A physician confirmed his condition was life-threatening. The child described forced starvation and abuse. An investigation led to felony child abuse/torture charges against the boy’s father and stepmother, both of whom received a lengthy prison sentence.
Parental Substance Abuse and Child Abuse
You are unsure if you have a child abuse report or a police report or neither. A seven-year-old student described to his classmates how his parents make meth at home on the stove.
Previous Legal/Ethical columns have dealt with a number of other child abuse reporting topics. See archived ASCA School Counselor magazine columns at www.schoolcounselor.org for more details on additional topics, or find them in “School Counseling Principles: Ethics and Law,” available for order at www.schoolcounselor.org.
Carolyn Stone, Ed.D., is a professor at the University of North Florida and the chair of ASCA’s Ethics Committee. Send your ethical questions to ethics@schoolcounselor.org.