Missouri
A Missouri law forbids pregnant women from divorce. A proposed bill looks to change that.
A bill aims to protect pregnant women who may be in domestic violence situations. Those facing domestic abuse can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-7233 or text “START” to 88788.
A controversial law in Missouri doesn’t allow pregnant women to get divorced. The legislation has been in place for 50 years, but there is now a push by a Democratic state representative to overturn it.
The state’s law was initially meant to “prevent what the courts consider the ‘bastardization’ of a child,” Missouri House Rep. Ashley Aune, a Democrat who represents the 14th district in Kansas City, told USA TODAY.
The law was aimed at protecting families and basically made it illegal for pregnant couples to get a divorce before the mother gives birth.
Aune sponsored House Bill 2402. The bill has bipartisan support and is co-sponsored by Rep. Richard Brown (Democrat, 27 District), Rep. Jeff Farnan (Republican, 1 District) and Rep. Sherri Gallick (Republican, 62 District).
The bill would allow “the court to enter a judgment of dissolution of marriage or legal separation if a person is pregnant.” In layman’s terms, it would give pregnant woman the ability to get a divorce finalized.
“Women are terrified for a million other reasons, let’s not give them one more,” said Aune. “Let’s give [women] a break.”
Law could lead to dangerous domestic violence situations
Aune says the issue was brought to her attention by Synergy Services, a Missouri shelter that provides women and their families a safe haven from violent situations.
“The intents [of the law] were noble and I can respect where they came from, however when we know better, we do better,” said Aune. “We know domestic violence is all too common, and one really distressing type of domestic violence is reproductive coercion, and often what that looks like is either an insistence or denial of pregnancy termination and sabotaging birth control.”
The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists defines reproductive coercion as “behavior that interferes with contraception use and pregnancy.” It is also commonly called “baby trapping” and can happen to both women and men.
Domestic violence: Minnesota shooting highlights dangers on calls for first responders and victims
Domestic violence advocate says the law gives abusers an advantage
Sara Brammer, the VP of Domestic Violence Services at Synergy Services in Kansas City, said that abusers are very conscious of this law and can use it to keep their spouses from divorcing them.
Brammer is responsible for Synergy’s domestic violence shelter and domestic violence housing program. She also directs Synergy’s Offender Intervention Program.
Around 80% of the people in the program were referred to the program via the court. The time spent in it ranges from 26 to 58 weeks and varies based on how high a survivor’s risk of death is from the violence they experienced. The program consists of seven groups made up of 12 to 15 people each that meet each week.
“I have heard it on both sides that both women feel coerced and not able to divorce, and men are conscious to the fact that [women] can’t get divorced when they’re pregnant,” Brammer told USA TODAY. “And they use that against their partner.”
Brammer said one of the men who was in the program tracked his wife’s ovulation cycle on his cell phone so he could make sure she was always pregnant while she was with him.
“We’re talking about something that is absolutely very coercive and manipulative,” said Brammer. “And there’s a law that supports that.”
She continues on to say that the law not only makes it more difficult for people to leave abusive situations, but it makes the people in those situations feel “powerless.”
Proposed bill is a way out of ‘bad situations’ for women and men, Rep. Aune says
“I have seen friends whose partners [were] incredible partners until they got pregnant, and then all of a sudden they became monsters,” said Aune
Aune said it’s time to give people another option to get out of marriages like the examples she gave. She believes this house bill will help men and women get out of “bad situations” that they are stuck in because of a pregnancy.
Aune said that since this bill gained publicity, men on Reddit are speaking up and saying that this law prevented them from getting out of their marriages.
One example Aune gave was a man whose wife became pregnant when he was deployed overseas.
“There’s obviously no way he was the father,” said Aune. “He was overseas, but he couldn’t divorce his wife.”
According to Aune, if a man’s wife is pregnant, he can’t leave her because the state automatically assumes he is the baby’s father because of their marriage.
A different Reddit user said that despite being separated from his wife, he wasn’t able to divorce her when she got pregnant with the man she was living with at the time of the separation. He says they weren’t allowed to divorce until the baby was born.
Next steps for the proposed bill that would overturn Missouri divorce law
The bill now heads to a House committee for a vote in order to advance. If that happens, next steps in the legislative process will include approval by the full state House and full state Senate. From there, it would end up on the governor’s desk awaiting his signature to officially become a law.
What other states have a divorce law like Missouri’s?
Currently, four states have bans that prevent pregnant women from getting divorced:
- Arkansas
- Arizona
- Missouri
- Texas
Julia is a trending reporter for USA TODAY. She has covered various topics, from local businesses and government in her hometown, Miami, to tech and pop culture. You can follow her on X, formerly known as Twitter, Instagram and TikTok: @juliamariegz.
Missouri
Many Missouri schools lack teachers to educate English language learners – Missourinet
Missouri’s population has a significant number of people from other countries, including many students who are learning in the public school system. Cammy Goucher, the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s Curriculum Director for English Language Development and World Languages, said Missouri has roughly 40,000 students whose primary language is not English but they are learning English.
She said out of 554 districts and charter schools, 134 have a teacher who specializes in educating English language learners (ELL). That’s about 25% of Missouri school districts with an ELL teacher.
“Some of those have only one teacher,” Goucher told Missourinet. “And then some of our larger areas have up to 90. I know we have, in many of our rural districts, schools who have 10 to 20 English learners and do not have a designated teacher that works with them.”
According to Goucher, the Missouri districts with the most ELL students include Springfield, Carthage, Monett, St. Louis, and Kansas City. Not all Missouri K-12 public school districts and charter schools have English language learners, but Goucher said that is expected to change in the near future.
To give you an idea on the teacher to student ratio, Goucher said the teachers are overburdened.
“In Missouri, we have about 870 English language development teachers serving those almost 40,000 students. Most of those teachers are in the larger districts,” she said.
If they do not have the appropriate teacher to educate these students, then how do the children learn?
“We like to work with those districts to first have them dedicate a person or a couple of people who will spend time working with the students. In some districts I’ve been to, that is a reading specialist, and a few districts is the school counselors,” Goucher said.
The state has five specialists who also help school employees with ways to teach these students who are working to become fluent in English. Does Missouri have enough specialists to serve the entire state?
“It is a tough job to serve everyone that we need to serve,” she said. “We would love to have more, and at one time we did have more. But because of budgetary reasons, we were cut, I believe, it was from nine down to five. There are other states, though, that don’t have anyone helping the person in my position. So, I’m thankful for the five I have.”
Regardless of whether Missouri’s school districts and charter schools have these specialized teachers, Goucher said every district should have a plan in place to be prepared to work with English language learners. If a district or charter school has at least 20 English language learners in their district or charter school, they are supposed to start looking for a full-time or part-time ELL teacher. Or someone within the district can be trained to become certified to teach these students.
Years ago, schools placed English language learners in special education courses. Goucher said that’s no longer happening.
“These students do not have a disability,” she said. “They have a difference. We have had instances where students are actually gifted or very well educated in their home language. They just don’t have English yet. So, it’s our job to kind of fill that gap.”
For ELL students who have been in the United States for less than one year, they are exempt from taking the English Language Arts portion of Missouri’s standardized MAP tests. When they take the assessment, or any end-of-course tests, the students can have a translator if one is available. They are also required to take an annual federally-mandated state assessment to measure their proficiency in English.
Goucher said Missouri is not alone in the short supply of English language development teachers.
“It’s pretty consistent everywhere,” says Goucher. “Everyone is kind of filling this need at this time- a lack of teachers that are certified to teach the students and an increasing number of students.”
Could artificial intelligence help to fill the gap in the ELL teacher shortage?
“That is something that is really taking off with English language learners,” she said. “One of the big reasons is that we can translate things into so many languages. And we can also create materials for our students. It’s only as good, though, as the questions that you provide. So, the teacher has to have the knowledge to create these tools, but I can see them as being a very good resource in the future.”
Goucher said the federal government has provided English language development teachers with a few workshops to ease them into using some of the artificial intelligence tools.
Copyright © 2024 · Missourinet
Missouri
Kehoe to visit southeast Missouri to assess storm damage – ABC17NEWS
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (KMIZ)
Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe will head to southeast Missouri on Tuesday to assess damage caused by storms that occurred throughout the weekend, according to a Monday press release from the governor’s office.
Kehoe was announced as the acting governor on May 17 as Gov. Mike Parson leads a trade mission delegation in Italy. He will serve as the acting governor until Tuesday, June 4, according to a previous press release. The trade mission lasted from May 18-25, but Parson and first lady Teresa Parson are taking personal time through June 4, according to the May 17 release.
Monday’s release states that Kehoe will be joined by State Emergency Management Agency Director Jim Remillard and other staff members from the governor’s office. Monday’s press release states that Kehoe’s visit will be primarily focused on the Sikeston area, which includes Scott and New Madrid counties. A storm-related fatality was reported in the area, the release says.
Storm damage was reported in the area and a large amount of power outages was reported on the outage maps on Ameren’s and Association of Missouri Electric Cooperatives’ website.
As of Monday evening, there were 3,985 Ameren customers in Stoddard County without power. AMEC’s map shows 1,426 electric customers in Stoddard County were without power, 1,224 of which were SEMO Electric Cooperative customers, while Ozark Border Electric Cooperative made up 201.
New Madrid County had 1,052 outages for Ameren customers and 553 outages for SEMO Electric customers
Ameren’s map shows 978 Scott County customers didn’t have power while 67 SEMO Electric customers didn’t have power. Butler County had 1,265 outages for Ozark Board Electric Cooperative customers, while 2,479 customers of that same company had outages reported in Ripley County.
Missouri
Southwest Missouri Congressman asks for federal government to defund diversity and inclusive programs
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (KY3) — Southwest Missouri U.S. Representative Eric Burlison is calling for the defunding of diversity, equity, and inclusion programs.
The Republican sent a letter to the White House budget director requesting information on how much the federal government spends on diversity programs. While they date back to the 1960s with affirmative action, there has been a renewed emphasis on the programs since the Black Lives Matter movement.
Rep. Burlison says non-merit-based hiring or management doesn’t work.
”I think that you’ve seen a lot of companies come to the conclusion that they’re, they’re chasing them, they’re chasing the equity, as opposed to chasing the goals of being a successful business, and making sure that in the day that there is a hatred spread within their workforce,” said Rep. Burlison.
President Biden, meanwhile, signed an executive order promoting diversity and inclusion in the federal workforce more broadly.
To report a correction or typo, please email digitalnews@ky3.com
Copyright 2024 KY3. All rights reserved.
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