Never Walked In High Heels

One of my best friends and I have been following a Supreme Court case which has recently completely engrossed our dinner time conversation. Last month they reached a verdict, but we still can’t let it go. A middle school-aged girl, suspected of hiding painkillers, was strip searched in front of the school nurse and another female teacher after no prescription drugs were found found in her locker. The US Supreme Court fortunately has ruled that the search was unconstitutional and went against an individual’s right to privacy. The student, and if I might say victim, in this situation is now in college and although the decision brings closure, it cannot begin to undo the damage brought on by the incident.

There’s something about being in a school setting, which forces individuals, who are otherwise quite pleasant, to come under the false assumption that there is no governing body higher than there own and nothing any parent or student can do to complain will ever have ramifications on an administrative career. The situation that invoked the Supreme Court case was of course every parent’s worst nightmare. You send your child to school to educate them in  reason and logic. You expect faculty and staff to treat your student with decency, showing them how a moral upright person is to behave in a larger society. Students are taught that they should trust their teachers, and I think the relationship with those in front of the classroom can often prove to be as important or as detrimental as a relationship with a parent. What happened was of course a breech of power, but it was so much more than that as well. What the students learned is that there is no law, and in this particular situation, that might makes right. Is a classroom full of young people where we want to call this into question? Forced to strip down to her underwear and shift her breasts to prove that there was nothing in her bra, the teachers who observed the strip search actually advocated for her to turn off her mind, her conscience, and her self-respect for their own suspicions.

What disturbs me about this case is that I know this abuse of power and manipulation of students happens on a daily basis. I have seen it happen in my own education, which is why I find the case so angering. If our teachers are responsible for educating and molding the next generation, what does it mean to teach children that there is no right to privacy and that any official can demand a strip search and must immediately be complied with? How can we ever teach that a woman has a right to choose what happens to her own body when this occurs? Such is a recipe for a rampant abuse of power particularly when brought upon a student who has no prior history of using any harmful substances. What is obvious about this situation is the fact that the faculty who administered the search were used to living in fear and thought that such mandatory complacency was perfectly acceptable. I wish more parents were involved in their children’s education to the extent of being willing to take the school administration to court when they are severely in the wrong. I am fortunate enough to have parents who were willing to do so and who taught me to do likewise. The greatest education that can be received often comes from the mistakes of the teachers who are supposed to be offering it freely. Battles with school administration are unfortunately an everyday occurrence if you are a student with a disability and critiquing though they might be, they teach you never to turn of your mind, always to question authority, and how to really be an aware individual, even if it means always being suspicious of those in charge.