What Qualifies as Maltreatment?
What Qualifies as Maltreatment- Information about what constitutes maltreatment.
Maltreatment of students includes physical abuse, sexual abuse, neglect, and in schools corporal punishment.
• Physical abuse: A report should be made in any case involving physical injury or threatened injury that is not inflicted by accidental means. Egregious and documented mental injury is also included in the definition of physical abuse.
• Sexual abuse: A report should be made in any case that involves illegal sexual contact. This does not include verbal sexual harassment.
• Neglect: A report should be made in any case involving failure to provide required care for a child, failure to protect a child from endangerment, or failure to provide appropriate supervision.
• Corporal punishment: Hitting or spanking a student with or without an object or the use of unreasonable physical force that causes bodily harm or substantial emotional harm are also maltreatment.
MDE E-mail Updates