that teacher Rosario Isabel Soto declared that she had reported to the Provincial Board of Education that she had been harassed between 1988 and 1999 by the Vice Principal, who was then temporarily suspended. Then there were the statements given by a minor, Mayra Hidalgo, and her mother in which they mention telling the Principal about the harassment of which pupil Mayra had been a victim and on account of which she had decided to leave that school. That was confirmed by teacher Cuenca, who declared that prior to what happened to Paola, she had accompanied another girl pupil to the Office of the Principal, where she accused the Vice Principal of having groped her to that she would receive a "pass" and be able to move on to the next year of studies. 148. Despite the incidents referred to in the foregoing paragraphs, the Commission points out that neither the Principal nor the female public servants who declared that they had some knowledge of the situation took any steps to prevent or investigate the Vice Principal's behavior. On the contrary, from the information available it transpires that there was permissiveness and tolerance of this state of affairs within this State school. 149. The State argued that at the time of these facts it did have appropriate and effective regulations in place to guarantee exercise of children's rights. However, in the Commission's view, the school staff had not received the training needed for them, as guarantors in charge of looking after children, to recognize abuse of authority and pupil harassment situations and to act accordingly. The Commission notes, on the contrary, from the statements made by the public servants aware of what was happening, total ignorance regarding the sexual harassment of girls and adolescents. Thus, when she heard about Paola's case, the Inspector General described the situation as a "crush" and teacher Cuenca approached Paola to ask her whether she was not "ashamed that people were saying she was a lover of old men". Putting a romantic twist on a situation of harassment between a public servant holding a position in which he wields authority and a pupil not only places the blame for the harassment on the victim, it also perpetuates discrimination and gender stereotypes. 150. Likewise, the Commission considers that the State's educational authorities responsible for such matters should have known what was going on in this State school by fulfilling their supervisory and inspection duties. The State has provided no information, nor does it transpire from the file on the case that State authorities had conducted inspections or regular visits to the school, with interviews with the pupils, like those that were conducted after Paola's death, or any other preventive measures. 151. The IACHR has stressed that in the case of girls, sexual violence situations are even more acute when they are regarded as objects of protection and not subjects of rights. 171 Likewise, the Commission has maintained that girls, for example, will often not turn to the justice system in cases of this type, for fear of reprisals "or simply because they assume that sexual violence is 'normal'”. 172 Thus, the Commission notes that Paola had no one to turn to at the school because there was no proper reporting mechanism whereby she, any of her schoolmates, or anyone else could have notified the authorities of the circumstances she was in, without fear of reprisals. The Commission points out that neither the school nor the State of Ecuador had preventive or early warning tools or accountability mechanisms vis-a-vis situations like that Paola experienced. Regarding this aspect, the inappropriate and stereotypical nature of the administrative proceedings was clearly demonstrated in the content of the reports issued on the instant case and their outcome, in the sense that the grounds given for Bolívar Espín's dismissal was abandonment of his post. As will be analyzed below, this minimized and covered up what had really happened and the seriousness of the violence endured by Paola and that led to her death, making it abundantly clear that the State lacked accountability mechanisms in keeping with its international obligations. 152. Based on what has been adduced thus far, the Commission considers that the responsibility of the State extends beyond that derived from failure to comply with the duty to respect human rights, as already analyzed, to include also responsibility for failing to comply with the prevention component of the duty to 171 172 IACHR, Access to Justice for Women Victims of Sexual Violence. Education and health, December 28, 2011, par. 13. IACHR. Access to Justice for Women Victims of Sexual Violence. Education and health, December 28, 2011, par. 20.