We are a grassroots coalition of activists lead by teachers and school staff employed in our nation’s K-12 schools, who are fed up with the excuses, ignorance, and minimization of the problem from our leaders. We needed to reach out to others beyond our own school sites and districts because there are SO FEW of us working on this problem from within. Shockingly, none of us were ever trained on recognizing, reporting, and intervening on student on student sexual harassment and violence, despite being mandated to do so.

This will be news to many teachers and school staff who find this site—you ARE mandated by federal law to do something about it, and you could lose your credential if you do not.

The sad reality though is that most educational leaders at the highest levels are not even aware of this, and think that Title IX, the laws which require us to have comprehensive training and interventions in place, is simply about gender equality in athletics.

It feels like complete lunacy to say this, but the California Office of Education made a big deal about upping their Title IX game in 2017 under pressure of the societal reckoning, but NOTHING has changed as a result. They went so far as to codify stricter language in California Education Code 221.5-231.5, but there is NO oversight.

The contrast between what the laws and CA Ed Code states, and what is happening on the ground in our schools, is a jaw dropping, head spinning total lack of compliance.

We began as a small group of teachers from all over the bay area who were isolated, exhausted, and furious. We fell into the sexual violence advocacy role because our students kept coming to us with the problem. This was never a job that our principals or district leadership asked us to do (on the contrary, they would very much like it if we shut the heck up). We were never paid to do this work. It was thrust upon us by our students and our own inability to give up on them. We held unique and rare positions on our campuses which highlighted us as potential champions to our students. One of us got into the work because she taught an ethnic studies class for girls, another advised the feminist club on her campus, still others were the advisors for their campus’s LGBTQIA+ student union.

Once this occurs, a whisper chain begins amongst the students, and our reputation is cemented—we are the de-facto adult on campus to tell. The more stories we heard, the more girls and other students came to report. Girls are brought to us during class, before class, after class, via email…

But we were unwilling to give up. We came together, researched the laws, and were shocked to learn that this was addressed 50 years ago, in the form of Title IX.

The first woman of color ever to serve in congress, the late Patsy T. Mink, authored this legislation over FIFTY years ago.

We each tried to dig into the problem alone, working in isolation from anyone else with knowledge or self-possession to help these students. We suffered SIGNFICANT backlash and microaggressions, and those of us without tenure lost jobs despite being very effective teachers. One of us even attempted to advocate for a child victim at the elementary level who was experiencing vicitmization from multiple perpetrators (one of whom was her teacher), and not only lost her job, but also had her credential pathways severed by the district.

We formed this space out of sheer desperation, and the need for love, truth, and beauty in such a morass of ugliness and lies. We have been blessed with sage wisdom from many, and the love and belonging just keeps growing. We have learned a lot, and are turning this knowledge into a framework for others.

Now, we are ready to get work, applying what we have learned, but we need ALL HANDS ON DECK! Please click the join now button if you are interested in helping this cause out! We need EVERYONE, not just school staff, to make our schools free from rape and sexual violence.