Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Thank goodness I was bullied in the 80's


Back in the good ol’ days of bullying a bully physically, and sometimes mentally and emotional, harassed his or her victim. We have probably all grown up on one side of this situation at one point or another. It’s a rough time in a kid’s life, and if worrying about school and girls were not enough, I had to find random trails home for lunch and after school every day. I had an older, and much bigger and meaner, neighbor that got his kicks out of torturing the few of us who were on this route. Each day it was a guessing game; ‘do you think he went through the softball path or the back trail. Unfortunately, these were the only two options so you had a 50/50 chance of being pummeled. Both paths were through a forest so the bully had several hiding spots. Usually the only thing that gave away the bully’s location was when you heard the screams of another boy was just got caught. Those were rough times, but I feel lucky that I am not going through today’s version of bullying. Of course, the bigger nasty bully still exists, as does the smaller, but sharp tongued emotional bully. Nevertheless, the new kind of bullying is the cyber bully.




The cyber bully may not hold your head in the snow until it feels frostbitten, but what makes this bully more powerful is there is virtually no escape from it. This form of bullying through mobile phones, emails, chat rooms, you tube, social networks, and so on, follows you everywhere. Normally the best part of your day when you are the victim of traditional bullying is getting to your house. You feel like, whew, I did it and now I am safe. But, cyber victims are never safe. Another problem is it is not normally just one bully after you, it can be a number of people and you may not even know who is doing it; leaving you feeling like you are always being watched or even stalked and you are not sure who is doing it. Obviously, this can be very emotionally and socially damaging to a student and no one should have to go through this.

So what should schools do about cyber bullying?



Based on my experience in various schools I would say that most are reactive when dealing with this issue rather that proactive. This is probably because it is a relatively new problem in society and many are not aware of it or not sure how to deal with it. I suggest the first thing to do is to change this reactive way of thinking and take preventative measures. Perhaps, this means teaching it in health class when we normally cover traditional bullying. However, I don’t think that is the most effective method. Developing a ‘social wellness’ program throughout the school might be better. This program should educate students and teachers about what the problem is, how serious it is (including the legal consequences for the bully), followed by how to recognize it and deal with it. Most importantly, students should know how to prevent it. That means having a school program that deals with this issue on an appropriate grade level basis. In the ISB middle school, synergy would be the best forum and Comm. Groups in the high school. I honestly don’t know if it is needed in the elementary school. I think this proactive campaign should be run at the same time for everyone to bring about more timely awareness and make the message clear. Then there should periodic reminders about the topic. Anything less might actually just teach students how to cyber bully and increase the problem. If a program is in place to help students and they know tips such as do not delete a cyber bullying message; instead take it to the appropriate person in the school, and then you can deal with the problem before it becomes an unstoppable mess. Students should know to report cyber bullying.
I’m curious as to stories, experiences, policies, and proactive measure others schools/teachers might have. Care to share?

2 comments:

  1. Kerry,

    Love the tales of your childhood, maybe you should hunt this bully down through facebook ;)

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  2. Kerry,

    I agree that it is common for schools to respond re actively rather than in ways that are designed to try and decrease the problem at its source. I think that all the teachers in schools need to be on board with this, to prevent a situation where some kids go through the system never having been formally and effectively taught about this issue.

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