SALEM, Ore. – Employees of the Salem-Keizer School District have to report when they hear about students having sex. 
 
 District officials say this is not a change in policy, but simply their way of clearing up the old one on the books after some employees raised questions. 
 
 Oregon law says if you're under 18 years old, you can't legally give consent to having sex, and it becomes abuse. It also requires anyone working for a child-caring agency to report child abuse and that includes sexual activity - even consensual sex between minors. 
 
 “I spoke to a legislator this morning and I'm sure it won't be the last conversation we have with our representatives to ensure that the way the legislation is implemented meets their intent,” said Lillian Govus, a spokesperson for the district. 
 
 Govus said a recent training session was meant to clarify their stance. However some people say it has only made the policy more confusing. 
 
 For example - if a student asks their teacher about birth control, that does not need to be reported. 
 
 "However, if a student inquires about birth control because they're being sexually active with a partner, then that is specific and that has to be reported under this legislature," explained Govus. 
 
 Parents and kids tell KATU News they believe enforcing this policy can break the trust established between teachers and students. 
 
 "So rather than reporting it to the authorities, use that to gain trust, get insight and educate the kids. That way you'll know what's going on," said parent Joyce Stevens. 
 
 
 
 If employees don't report, however, they could be found guilty of a misdemeanor. They would face fines and could lose their job. 
 
 It is harder to tell what would happen to the students that the teachers report on could. 
 
 "Now what the state does with the information that we report to them is ultimately up to them. They may not take any action on it at all. They may go do a site visit. Or they may do a further investigation," said Govus. 
 
 More than 500 people have signed a petition against the reporting. Those against the policy have held a rally on the Capitol steps, and they say another one is in the works. 
 
 
 
 KATU’s Joe English talked with several legislators Wednesday and said it doesn't seem they intended the strict reporting requirements. People can call or email their state representative If they think the statutes need to be revised or new laws re-written, and legislators may take on the task and get the process started. 
 
 ||||| Teachers in one Oregon school district who fail to report the sexual activity of their students could be at risk of being fined or losing their jobs. 
 
 The Salem-Keizer district officials told teachers that if they hear about their students having sex they must report it to law enforcement or Department of Human Services officials. District officials say they are just following state law that has put them in a bind with their students. 
 
 “This is the perfect storm of state legislation," Lillian Govus, a spokeswoman for Salem-Keizer, told Newsweek. “We are erring on the side of caution.” 
 
 Oregon law says that sex under the age of 18 is considered abuse and teachers have to report their students, according to the district. Teachers risk a misdemeanor charge if they don't. 
 
 The district was holding its annual mandatory reporting training in October when it was asked to clarify whether teachers should report sex between students. In its training, the district gave examples to teachers to further explain when they should report. One of the examples said teachers should report a 15-year-old student who said she is having sex with her boyfriend and wants to talk about birth control, according to the Statesman Journal. 
 
 The clarification led to a petition with more than 600 signatures asserting that students should have the freedom to talk freely about sexual topics without fearing getting reported. 
 
 Students who signed the petition argued that the rule would keep victims of sexual assault silent out of fear of being reported. 
 
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 Students even took to the state capitol on Monday to protest the law. Govus said students did the right thing by protesting. 
 
 Deborah Carnaghi, Child Protective Services spokeswoman, told the Journal that the department encourages reporting to have a “rather-be-safe-than-sorry approach.” 
 
 But reporting does not necessarily mean that the department will follow up. The department decides on a case-by-case basis on whether to visit a school. 
 
 “Just because something is reported to the state does not mean the state will come investigate two kids dating for years,” Govus said. “If there is nothing that ticks their investigative boxes, then it may just get filed away.” 
 
 Other districts around the state do not appear to be following state law as closely as Salem-Keizer district. Govus said teachers in her district are fearful of losing their jobs for not reporting so they are heeding the law. 
 
 “People’s careers are on the line,” she said. ||||| Students, teachers united against reporting changes 
 
 By ERIC A. HOWALD 
 
 Of the Keizertimes 
 
 An expansion of mandatory reporting policies in the Salem-Keizer School District isn’t sitting well with teachers or students at McNary High School. 
 
 Teachers were notified in the second week of October that they would need to take an additional mandatory reporting training online and, by early last week, teachers, students and even parents were challenging the new rules in private and through petition and protest. 
 
 “It’s really nice to be able to go to our teachers because there are some things you aren’t comfortable talking with your parents about. The teachers at McNary are genuinely caring. They want to help you succeed and be there as an ear,” said Kimberly Schott, a McNary junior and an organizer of a protest in downtown Salem Monday, Oct. 23. 
 
 “The district wants a safe, healthy environment, but I don’t feel safe if I can’t talk about some of these issues without getting reported,” said Schott. 
 
 Schott also initiated an online petition at change.org (http://bit.ly/2y1ayDY) that has garnered more than 500 signatures. A sit-in protest was planned for Tuesday, Oct. 24, at the school. 
 
 Prior to the changes, SKSD teachers were required to report incidences of suspected neglect or any type of abuse to the Department of Human Services, but the new guidelines expand reporting to most sex-related issues. New instances that would require reporting include: a student inquiring about birth control options after admitting to sex with a partner; reports of a pregnancy; a student confiding in a teacher after being kicked out of his home for divulging a sexually active, same-sex relationship. 
 
 The training materials suggest that the new guidelines were put in place based on current child abuse reporting laws and “conversation with community partners who are experts on the issue.” 
 
 A spokesperson for the district, Lillian Govus, said, “This is not a change in policy, merely a clarification. As mandatory reporters, we simply give the information to the correct agencies, but it is up to their discretion whether action would be taken. This presentation is being shared with all Salem-Keizer employees to ensure we are in compliance with this law.” 
 
 However, the clarification feels like a stretch, said Ricky Galvin, a McNary sophomore. 
 
 “The law says to report sexual abuse and rape and nothing about consensual sex,” Galvin said. “What’s the point of them teaching sex ed if a student does decide to have safe sex and ends up getting reported when they want to talk about it?” 
 
 It also made junior Marissa Dougall, another student organizer, feel uneasy. 
 
 “This change wasn’t communicated to students or parents except through teachers. If I didn’t know about this rule, what other rules don’t I know about that could get me reported?” Dougall said. 
 
 Talk within the school rapidly turned to finding the loopholes in the new policy, Dougall added. 
 
 “In my advisory class, we talked about this the entire period. We decided we could come in, talk about situations hypothetically and there wouldn’t be anything to report without names,” she said. 
 
 In response to the new guidelines regarding inquiries to teachers about birth control, Dougall and Schott pointed out that students could walk into Planned Parenthood and receive birth control without parental knowledge. 
 
 Galvin bristled at an example regarding the homosexual student. 
 
 “He just got kicked out of his home, and now he’s potentially dealing with a investigation? Does the student have to deal with it or the parents or does the district just let it go because it’s too hard to deal with? If they can just let that go, why not all the other ones?” Galvin said. 
 
 That particular example also raised the hackles of a McNary teacher who spoke on the condition of anonymity. 
 
 “I’m not reporting that kid to DHS, he’s needs to get a home and help. I’m not going to turn him in for having sex. He’s already vulnerable and at a high risk for suicide,” the teacher said. 
 
 Under prior guidelines, the teacher said they were still cautious about student interaction, but not afraid to intervene. 
 
 “If a kid is in the hallway bawling and I always ask them to tell me what’s going on. I ask if it’s social or school. They might say it’s social and I ask if it’s friend or boyfriend drama,” the teacher said. 
 
 The next questions revolve around whether the student is being hurt by someone, the teacher said. Depending on the specifics of the issue and the gender of the student, the teacher said they would either counsel the student themselves or refer them to a teacher of the same gender. 
 
 If the teacher overhead students talking about consensual sex, the students were asked to change the topic. 
 
 “To me, I feel like I’m being told to tell the students to shut up,” the teacher said. “Teachers are also being told to establish appropriate adult-student connections so that when students come to school they feel safe and cared for. If students have a trusted adult at school that they need to talk with about sex, I see no problem with teachers being that.” 
 
 To a one, the students rallying support against the changes found it hard to believe the roles they’ve assumed in the last two weeks, but all three mentioned an easily overlooked situation that will occur frequently if the new guidelines stand: numerous teachers at McNary and elsewhere in the district have students in Salem-Keizer schools. There’s no delineation in the new guidelines for those situations. 
 
 “That’s crazy,” said Schott. “We are losing our trust in the district that is supposed to help us grow into the adults.”
– Teachers and staff of an Oregon public school district are disturbed at a district rule requiring them to report any student sexual activity—whether they know about it for a fact or just suspect it, and even if it involves their own children—to law enforcement or state officials. According to the Salem-Keizer district, the requirement is necessary under the state's mandatory reporting and child abuse laws—all district employees are mandatory reporters and as such are required to report when they have "reasonable cause" to suspect a child is being abused—but the Statesman Journal reports that most other school districts in the state don't consider consensual sexual activity between teens to be something teachers are required to report. More than 1,300 people have signed an online petition asking the school board chairman to put an end to the requirement. The superintendent explains the policy is not new, but the district recently added a training session dealing with situations employees would be required to report. Some of those situations included things like a 15-year-old confiding that she's having sex with her boyfriend and needs birth control, a 14-year-old telling a teacher his parents kicked him out over a same-sex relationship that has turned sexual, or a teacher's own 17-year-old son confessing his 16-year-old girlfriend is pregnant. Employees and students alike say they're concerned that under this requirement, students will lose trusted confidantes at school and will have a harder time getting access to information about safe sex. A district spokesperson tells KATU she has been in touch with a legislator about the law's interpretation, and adds to Newsweek that the district is "erring on the side of caution."