After an amazing string of teacher-student sex trysts throughout the state, a Senate committee in Alabama has approved a bill that would force taxpayer-funded teachers to undergo an hour of training each year to learn that having sex with underage students is not a good thing to do.
The Alabama Senate Education Policy Committee passed Senate Bill 274, the Educator-Student Interaction Training Act, last week, reports The Birmingham News.
The bill’s sponsor, Republican Cam Ward of Alabaster, said he is optimistic that a general state Senate vote will occur this week.
If the bill becomes law, it would require mandatory annual sessions for all public school teachers on avoiding sex with students and on appropriate social media interaction. The bill would also require training on the proper use of corporal punishment.
The superintendent of Alabama’s public schools would oversee the development of the teacher instruction.
Ward, the sponsor, says mandatory training is necessary each year because Alabama is a celebrated hotbed of teacher-student sex.
It’s true. The state of about 4.8 million residents (a little over half the population of New York City) produces trysts between students and teachers like so much kudzu. (RELATED: PROOF: Alabama Is The Teacher-Student Sex Capital Of The USA)
The Birmingham News has collected an ever-growing list of dozens of stories on the topic since 2008. Over 50 of these incidents are from 2012 or later.
Just this week, Decatur High School cheerleading coach and social studies teacher Carrie Cabri Witt, 42, was arrested for having sex with a student, according to The Decatur Daily.
Earlier this month, small-town Alabama high school English teacher and cheerleading coach Katherine Nelson, 29, was arrested on charges that she had a sexual relationship with a male student. School district officials hastily removed Nelson’s biography from the Brookwood High School website. “I am so thrilled to be teaching at BHS!” it gushed. “Both of my parents are educators, and I strongly believe that played a role in how I got a passion for teaching and a love for students.” (RELATED: High School Cheerleading Coach Traumatized Male Student With Sex, Cops Say)
Last year, rural Opp High School English teacher Ashley Hall earned the dubious honor of being the fifth woman arrested just in her part of the state for allegedly having sex with a male student.
Alabama state law prohibits teachers from sex with any students under the age of 19.
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