In the past 25 years, Berkeley High School has dealt with two major scandals involving sexual assault by teachers and employees, and many other schools in California have experienced similar issues. In light of more scandals, allegations, and events relating to sexual assault, California has put into effect a new law, Senate Bill 848. Senate Bill 848 creates measures that enforce higher education for school staff, improve reporting requirements and pathways, and stop teachers who are legitimately accused – with strong anecdotes and evidence – from getting jobs in other districts.
Senate Bill 848 was first written by Senator Sasha Renée Pérez of Pasadena, CA. The law states that all California schools, public and private, must submit comprehensive school plans by July 1, 2026, aimed at preventing sexual assault as well as detecting and addressing it. The bill was signed into law on Oct. 7, 2025, by Governor Gavin Newsom and was put into effect on Jan. 1, and was written as a response to ongoing concerns about sexual misconduct and to hold perpetrators accountable.
The bill includes an expansion of mandated reporters, requiring that all school teachers, staff, and employees become reporters of abuse. This is more adults than before. It adds classified employees, janitors, coaches, and any other employee who works for the school but doesn’t have a certificate, to the list of mandated reporters. Additionally, the bill targets education of school staff, mandating annual training on sexual abuse, reporting, and abuse prevention.
Berkeley High has already begun to workshop annual training sessions. "At a recent GESHAC meeting, I learned that our Title IX coordinator led a training session, which made teachers feel much more confident in how to respond,” Maya Gearen, a senior representative for Gender Equity and Sexual Harassment Advisory Committee (GESHAC), said.
“The law was written in order to ensure that student safety was the priority, as opposed to protecting employees being the priority,” Peggy Scott said. Scott is a former BHS parent who has worked alongside other parents to provide safety to the students of BHS in light of BHS scandals.
A large portion of the bill involves creating a state-wide database where substantiated reports, accusations with logic and/or evidence, misconduct, assault, or abuse involving employees are recorded. This comes in response to an issue in which teachers who were being reported and investigated would leave the district right after the investigation began and would then get hired by a different district. When hiring, employers must check the system to avoid the practice of “passing the trash.” “That's what passed the trash is, a system that lets someone who has behaved badly, violated laws, (and) done bad things at one school district somehow get jobs at other school districts later, because nobody will really talk about what that person did,” Heidi Goldstein, a former BHS parent and former sponsor of BHS Stop Harassing, said. BHS Stop Harassing is a student club that aims to end rape culture at BHS. Senate Bill 848 will reduce "passing the trash" through better-kept records.
In 2024, Berkeley Unified School District paid a settlement of $13.5 million to the students in response to a 2021 lawsuit they filed, claiming the district ignored and mishandled prior complaints about Bissell. He resigned in 2021 in an agreement with this district that included keeping his personnel records locked. The student’s lawsuit, and a public records request by the news site Berkeleyside, exposed the records which showed years of student complaints against Bissell, and concerns by school administration.
Later, in 2010 an Academic Choice counselor at BHS named Anthony Smith was accused by a student of ongoing sexual harassment and inappropriate physical conduct. After many months, the family of the 16-year-old students filed a federal lawsuit against Smith. They also filed a lawsuit against BUSD, stating that the district had been indifferent and slow to respond to their daughter’s complaints and reports.
Under Senate Bill 848, the district is required to report credible abuse cases of teachers and other school staff to the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, which is charged with managing the new abuse database, which hiring schools must consult as they screen candidates.
There are many other cases around California that are similar to the ones of Bissell and Smith. Senate Bill 848 addresses how schools deal with misconduct and reports, and how they keep track of employees who are perpetrators of misconduct. The Bissell case exposed failures in how complaints towards the schools and the district were handled. Looking forward, Senate Bill 848 aims to dismantle systems that are slow to respond to misconduct and give way for teachers to find workarounds and avoid accountability.