Speaking Up: The SAS Sexual Assault Case

The news of the recent dismissal of the Shanghai American School English teacher for sexual assault broke out amongst many of China’s international schools. This issue sparked with James Mikkelson, an AP English teacher at SASPX, who was accused of sexual misconduct to students both on and off of school property.

In November, James Mikkelson was dismissed from Shanghai American School for various cases of sexual assaults that were directed towards students of all ages in the school. Allegations were made based on the findings of the authorized investigation on Mikkelson’s school computer where evidence of porn clips, videos, and sexually explicit chat histories with students were found.

Soon after the dismissal, an anonymous victim of Mikkelson’s created a blog that gives all the victims of his sexual misconduct a platform to share their stories with the rest of the international school community. In the posts, students revealed that Mikkelson not only was engaged in sexting, he also groped and even went as far as performing sexual intercourse with students.

The victims were scared to speak out because many of them believed that Mikkelson’s constant grooming, an action that is practiced to establish an emotional connection with the minor with an intention of sexual abuse, was reassuring. As students, Mikkelson’s validation halted their willingness to speak out as they did not want their daily school life to be negatively affected. Mikkelson further created an image of being the “adult you can talk to” and “the friend” to appeal and lure the students to him. Furthermore, he took advantage of the emotions the students had towards him to impose his actions.

AISG student, David Hu, told us his take on this issue: “I think no teacher should have an unfair advantage over any student, relating to academics or even outside of academics.” He also said, “whenever someone is assaulted in any means, speak out, do not hold it in. It won’t change anything.” He also mentioned that “grief and trauma can cause more damage in the long term,” emphasizing the importance of standing up for yourself.

Cecilia Li, an ISB student that has also heard of the story, was shocked by the incident. “This is very new to me, I feel very bad for the victims,” she stated, “Mikkelson also reminds me of one of the teachers in our school; he got sacked a while ago but I remember what happened very clearly.” She further warned in the international school community by saying “this doesn’t only happen in one school, I think all of us should be on the watch out for this.”

Although occurrences like these seem unlikely to happen to us, it is still crucial for us to protect ourselves from any possibilities. If something like this does happen, always remember to speak up, and don’t let any more “Mikkelson’s” invade anyone’s life.