Very disappointed to read New Hampshire Senate passed a so-called “Parental Bill of Rights,” Senate Bill 72, a law that claims to empower parents but that will actually endanger students. As a former high school and middle school counselor, I witnessed too many cases of child abuse of students 11 to 18 years of age perpetrated by family members. The most damaging involved a teenage girl impregnated by her own father and another 12 year old girl consistently raped by a half-brother brought into the family home by her mother’s remarriage. Both girls ended up in my office because they were afraid to tell the spouse of the offending parent or that it was his son in one of the cases. As a mandated court reporter, like all school counselors, I supported each girl while she told her parent with the appropriate law officer in attendance. Tough and painful decisions were made in both instances. Tess Sumner, student at Newfound Regional High School, is right when she said in her My Turn that students need safe places and people to go to when they need help and support solving problems. Teachers, coaches and counselors are often people they turn to when their parents are not available. As to SB 72 allowing parents the right to exclude their students from sex education curriculum, that law has been in existence since I was a child 50 years ago.

Kay Marie Anderson

Laconia