Question

Principle II: Responsibility for Professional Competence: C: The professional educator acts in the best interest of all students. Scenario: An educator overhears a conversation between two of her students. One of her students is talking about how dangerous it is for him to walk home. He lives in an area with known gang activity. Every day, when he walks home, he is getting in fights with gang members in his area. The educator stops the conversation and asks the student if he is all right. He shows her a bruise on his arm and leg, which he received in yesterday’s fight. He says he is fine because he is used to it and that she does not have to worry about it because it is not happening on school grounds. The educator tells him to be careful and does not discuss the situation with anyone else. The student walks home that day, and gets beat up again. Which professional tenet has the educator violated?

Answer 1

Answer:

The correct answer to the question: Which professional tenet has the educator violated? Would be: Protecting students from any practice that harms, or has the potential to harm, students.

Explanation:

The reason for this being the answer comes from the very principle placed in the question: Principle II: Responsibility for Professional Competence: C: The professional educator acts in the best interest of all students.

In this scenario, specifically, the educator finds herself with the situation of a student that she has learned places that student in direct danger. He has to walk home every day and go through a portion of town where gang problems are present. Not only that, but she learns that her student has had to face fights with these gang members on several ocassions, which means that her student has faced not only harm, but the danger of becoming involved with gangs. Instead of acting as she should have professionally, which was to seek the best steps to help the student resolve his issue, she decides to only tell him to be careful and never says anything about the case. This completely violates her duty as a teacher to protect her students and ensure that potential harming situations are dealt with appropriately.