Cesena, 3 May 2024 – Students Of fifth graders shocked from the images of one sexual lesson in the classroom. It is the incipit of a story that ended up in court and recently concluded in the Supreme Court with the confirmation of dismissal of a teacher. The event, which shocked the school community and the parents of the students, happened in one Cesena primary school In the September 2019. During a lesson some students allegedly argued in class using epithets of a sexual nature. So the teacher who was with them, a novice substitute teacher, decided to improvise a sexual education lesson which, however, cost her the dismissal. After five years the labor section of the Supreme Court has confirmed the second degree sentence unsuccessfully appealed by the woman, agreeing with the Ministry of Education which had fired the teacher. The woman who taughtDante Alighieri Institute of Cesena, immediately opposed the ministry’s decision, also questioning the validity of the evidence which included statements from the pupils involved. But the judges at both first and second instance (Court of Forlì and Court of Appeal of Bologna) had found her wrong, claiming that she had addressed the delicate topic without discussing it with her colleagues and causing upset in the children. The discomfort expressed by the fifth grade students had also been noticed by another teacher who had turned to the head teacher. Furthermore, It was the parents themselves who protested to the principal. The teacher was interviewed by our newspaper immediately after the incident. “I didn’t do anything wrong. I showed a video on youtube with music – said the teacher – the students asked me if I had a sexual life, even in vulgar tones, but I answered them in the appropriate terms as we teachers do. I have always done my job as best I can and I have always scolded the students even for swearing.”
Second the sentences of merit the teacher “had delved into a delicate topic, that of topics related to sexuality and procreation, as a result of an inappropriate context (the discussion between children, where strong words of a sexual nature were used) without planning with the other teachers, in the class in which she had recently started teaching, with the ultimate effect of causing disturbance in the students, which was immediately evident when they left school with their parents”.
They do not have convinced the reasons for the appeal presented by the fired teacher who denied the reconstruction of the facts that emerged in the first and second instance. The Court of Cassation established with this ruling that sexuality and affection are delicate topics that schools cannot address at willwithout adequate preparation and sharing.
The manager of the Simonetta Ferrari elementary school recalls that at the time of the incident he had expressed solidarity with the manager at the time, Marinella Verazzani. The accused teacher had attempted to defend herself with various arguments in her appeal. She had denied using vulgar or crude language with the children, claiming to have drawn and shown only images of an egg and a sperm and not of genital organs. Images that greatly scandalized the little ones who returned home in shock.
