Dear families,

Protecting children and ensuring they can learn and succeed in a safe environment is one of our top priorities.

This is the foundation for the Know the Line initiative. 

As Superintendent Dr. Bernier shares in a special video message, the purpose of Know the Line is to inform all stakeholders of the healthy boundaries that should exist between students and employees. We also want to ensure students and families know how to recognize and report any behavior that might cross those lines.

These guidelines have been a part of employee training for years. While all employees undergo thorough background screening, and the overwhelming majority of our employees would never harm a child, we want parents and students to understand these boundaries so that they can report, and we can quickly intervene before a situation becomes a potential threat to student safety.

Healthy boundaries include the following:

• Communication – There should be no interactions between students and employees via phone calls, text, or social media. The only appropriate communication outside of school between employees and students should be with the following district-approved and monitored platforms: Teams, Rooms (on the district’s new app), or via emails from duvalschools.org accounts. Even with these platforms, one-on-one communication is discouraged.
  

• Physical Contact – Both employees and students are discouraged from any physical contact beyond a handshake, a high-five, or fist bump.
  

• Meetings – We encourage employees to plan ahead so they’re not alone with students.  There are certain cases where this may be unavoidable. For example, when school counseling, mental health, or physical health services are being provided. In these cases, we are encouraging employees to balance the need for student privacy while still making sure they are in another individual’s line of sight.

Violations of these standards can result in employee disciplinary action.

To report concerns, we encourage students and families to complete the Employee Misconduct Reporting Form.