I was heartbroken and saddened to read your article on “The bully effect” (Dec. 1) because more than 20 years ago, I addressed bullying in my child’s school.
This mother is right to expect that her elementary school principal, and everyone up to the superintendent, should protect her children. There is a provision in the state constitution, which declares, “All students and staff of primary, elementary, junior high, and senior high schools have the inalienable right to attend campuses which are safe, secure, and peaceful.”
Clearly, her daughters are not in a safe, secure, or peaceful environment. Bullying happens in all grades. I dealt with bullying in kindergarten through high school with my kids. I talked to other parents and found more cases and worse things occurring to other children. I wrote a letter to the school district administration and held several group meetings with the superintendent and the parents.
In 2003, an anti-bullying program was adopted in that district. The mother is right, parents need to get involved, but don’t wait for the school district to do it.
Stopbullying.gov is a comprehensive site with information for parents and example policies for school districts to adopt. I hope the Orcutt Union School District does a little more than, “notify the parents of the victims and perpetrators and contact law enforcement if bullying is severe and ongoing.” Really? Why wait until it is severe and ongoing? Where is the investigation? Where are the consequences? Based on your article, the boy involved had already bullied another girl. Where was the school supervision and accountability?
By not taking action, school officials allowed the aggressive student to continue to attack other students. Also, because bystanders saw no rule enforcement, they apparently decided to join in, making the situation worse.
It sounds like the administration is minimizing and avoiding this problem, which allows it to grow. Worrying about “labeling a 6-year-old a bully” or whether “the problem starts at home” is beside the point. What Ms. Blow can control is what happens in school. Set behavioral standards and enforce them, it’s that simple.
If bullying is most common from 6 years old to 12 years old, that means that it is happening in first grade, when students are 6 years old, not fourth grade as she stated. Ms. Blow’s statement that “the biggest thing is giving them the skills to stand up for themselves, giving them the skills to report and have counseling support,” shows she is not being proactive and preventing the acts. The student should not have to stand up for him/herself, they reported the bullying once, now what is the school going to do? I once heard a similar statement from a principal concerning my kindergartner being bullied and I said, “No, you are going to provide a safe environment, the kindergartner is not going to do your job.”
What most professionals recognize is that bullying has a cumulative effect. Ms. Blow may not be concerned about isolated incidents of name-calling, but if that is happening over and over throughout the day—from several students—it is bullying and has terrible effects. Each student may not know that another student just made a hurtful remark 10 minutes ago. The victim may only name the one(s) he/she remembers, and so it seems it only happened once or twice. Without further investigation, how would the school staff know if it was ongoing and pervasive in that case?
In my experience, schools and school districts will rarely admit there is a bullying problem. Perhaps out of fear it will tarnish their reputation or perhaps out of fear they will have to do something about it.
Your article described the basics of an anti-bullying program pretty well. However, if you have school personnel deciding that they are not going to act unless the action falls under their personal definition of “bullying,” the program is not going to be effective. Here are some other anti-bullying program techniques that I have seen in other schools:
1) A method for anonymous reporting.
2) A buddy program to pair victims with a support student(s).
3) A conflict resolution team of peers to handle disputes. Also, the book The Bully, the Bullied and the Bystander by Barbara Coloroso is an excellent resource.
Solving bullying isn’t easy, but it is possible if the school district is consistently following a good program.
Rachelle W. Toti is a parent and has worked as a kindergarten through 12th grade substitute teacher for 10 years in two different school districts. She lives in Arroyo Grande. Send comments to the editor at scone@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Dec 15-22, 2016.
