Cosenza, high school busy fighting the professor’s harassment: “And now let them listen to us”

Self today the inspectors are at the Valentini-Majorana Institute in Castroliberoprovince of Cosenza, to investigate the alleged sexual harassment by the professor of Mathematics, it is because, three years after finishing high school, Marta (the name is fictional) found the courage to publicly report the abuse she suffered while he attended high school.

As in a kind of #MeToo, after having launched a dedicated Instagram page, @ call.out.valentini.majorana, Marta has begun to collect reports of other girls who are still studying in that high school. Minister Patrizio Bianchi, after having heard the school office of Calabria, asked for a report from the head teacher. Meanwhile the students occupied the lecture hall and the gym to ask for listening.

What was going on in his high school?
“For three years the professor continued to make physical appreciations and sexual innuendo. But he went as far as rubbing and explicit requests for sex. It took me a while to point out that his was not flattery, but real abuses: the context, in the school, was profoundly male chauvinist, and the boys would never have said a word to defend us. They protected the professor and felt protected by him ».

Other girls were in the same condition as her.
“Yes, and for some it was even worse. A classmate of mine had been targeted for her breasts and she was subjected to constant harassing plots and attempts to approach. To yet another, which she did before when I was a senior year, the professor offered a pass in exchange for a photo of her breasts “.

Have you talked about it with the manager?
“The principal said at first she didn’t believe it. Then she called my classmate back to the office making sure that the teacher was also present, and we all know how difficult it is to talk about violence in front of your attacker. After that meeting, you dismissed the episode by saying that it was just jokes, and that my partner didn’t know how to play jokes ».

And for the photo in exchange for the pass?
“The principal laughed, then summoned the girl’s parents and together they formulated the text for a complaint to the police. The document, however, never reached the police ».

Marta, you also seem very angry with the principal.
“Yes: over the years he has always covered up and trivialized every report of harassment. He was aware of what was going on, but he told the girls that they were just looking for attention and that their stories could not be trusted. She told me that my grandmother, whom she knew, would be ashamed of me and my behavior. And now, when I launched the Instagram page, she also sued me for defamation ».

And you, have you not reported the violence to the police?
“That’s our intention. I have already collected at least three testimonies, and we are organizing a collective complaint. The victims are many more, but many are afraid to put their faces on it for fear of repercussions: some attend the fifth grade, and are terrified of being punished for having “muddied” the good name of the school ».

What is your goal?
“We discovered that the professor was teaching in a technical institute, from which he had been expelled for the same reason. So many girls have had to deal with his harassment, many are still undergoing it, and we don’t want any more to be added. We do not want this person to continue to work in the school and with the girls ».

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