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Educator Sexual Abuse: Introduction and Overview

Over the past decade, concurrent with the Catholic clergy sexual abuse crisis, educator sexual abuse has emerged as the latest chapter in the history of child sexual abuse (CSA). A broad definitional perspective was adopted by U.S. Department of Education (2004), who defined educator sexual misconduct as “behavior by an educator at a student and intended to sexually arouse or titillate the educator or the child.” While a federal data clearinghouse on educator sexual abuse does not yet exist, it was recently reported (Walz, 2010) that “about 400 teachers are charged with having sexual relations with their students each year in the United States; these are people who students not only see on a regular school day but also chat with outside of class” (para. 4). It was also noted that “a nationwide Associated Press investigation published in October 2007 found 2,570 educators lost their teaching credentials or were otherwise sanctioned from 2001 to 2005 following allegations of sexual misconduct” (Associated Press, 2008; para. 6). U.S. Department of Education (2004) lamented that “we have scant data on incidence and even less on descriptions of predators and targets” (p. 51). This special section’s four papers offer new essential insights on educator sexual abuse, including keen clinical perspectives that will contribute to the emerging literature of approaches to prevention and intervention, including treatment and training of administrators and teachers to address this