Teachers will have their licences automatically revoked if found guilty of groping or sexually touching students, following a Toronto Star investigation into transfers of abusive teachers from school to school.

This will also apply retroactively to any historical cases after amendments the Ontario College of Teachers Act were enacted Tuesday following a promise from the province in January to crack down on sexually abusive teachers.

Students who were victimized by sexually abusive teachers will also be eligible for new funding to access therapy and counselling, administered by the Ontario College of Teachers, the provincial oversight and licensing body.

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One wrong just creates another wrong: how the quiet transfer of teachers over disciplinary issues has led to a pattern of abuse in schools

Teachers who commit certain forms of sexual abuse allowed to keep their licences

“Today our government passed legislation to strengthen the disciplinary actions for teachers and early childhood educators, aligning them with regimens for health professionals,” said a statement prepared on behalf of the Ministry of Education. “This will help ensure that the (college) further has the tools they need to respond to cases of professional misconduct and make sure student safety is prioritized.”

Under the Protecting Students Act, a 2016 amendment to the Ontario College of Teachers Act and the Early Childhood Educators Act, if a teacher engages in intercourse, masturbation, child pornography or any of the following contacts — genital-to-genital, genital-to-oral, anal-to-genital, and oral-to-anal — their licence must be revoked.

As a result of Tuesday’s amendments, teachers who touch a student’s genitals, anus, breasts or buttocks, or other conduct of a sexual nature, will now be subject to automatic licence revocation as well.

“This particular provision could address activities such as ‘spooning,’ ” the college said in a document with submissions made to the government Standing Committee last month.

Any other findings of sexual abuse that don’t result in revocation will now carry a mandatory suspension of the teacher’s licence. The discipline committee at the college will also be able to immediately suspend a teacher facing revocation before their hearing, if that teacher “exposes or is likely to expose students to harm or injury,” the ministry confirmed.

The Star’s investigation has detailed how teachers in the province can be transferred to another school after their boards find reason to discipline them. In some of the province’s largest school boards, there is no requirement to tell a new principal about the incoming teacher’s past.

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The Star identified 27 cases heard by the Ontario College of Teachers, the provincial oversight and licensing body, between January 2012 and November 2017. In each case, the teacher had been investigated by their school board, disciplined and transferred at least once by the time their case made it to a college hearing.

In all of the cases, the college’s disciplinary panel — made up of publicly appointed and teacher-elected college members — substantiated allegations of sexual, physical, psychological or verbal abuse, or serious misconduct by those teachers. In nine of the 27 cases identified, the teachers had reoffended at their new school.