School forced teacher to face student who sexually harassed her — she ultimately took sick leave

A school forced a homeroom teacher to continue teaching in person after she received a sexually harassing letter from one of her students, it has emerged.

According to the Gyeonggi Province Teachers' Union and other sources, a second-year male high school student, identified only as A, sent a sexually harassing letter in June to his female homeroom teacher, identified as B, at a high school in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi Province.

The letter reportedly mentioned B's name about 34 times without honorifics and described the student imagining every sexual act he could with her. It also contained multiple threats demanding that she reciprocate his feelings.

A had also been engaging in repeated stalking-like behavior toward B throughout the school, causing her to experience symptoms including nausea whenever she encountered him. B requested that the school's teacher rights protection committee convene, and A was subsequently reassigned to a different homeroom class.

The reassignment only changed A's homeroom, however. Because no substitute teacher was available for the elective course B taught, she was still required to teach him in that class, leaving the separation effectively incomplete. B would have to face A in person once the new semester began.

B asked the school to arrange alternatives such as online supplementary instruction or hiring a part-time instructor, but the school did not accept her requests. She ultimately took sick leave on Tuesday.

"Even after the class reassignment was ordered, and with more than a month between the committee's decision and the start of the semester, the school failed to achieve any real separation," the teachers' union said. "In the end, it was the victimized teacher — not the offending student — who had to leave the classroom on sick leave. This case starkly exposes the gaps in the current system for protecting teachers."