BULLYING Prevention: Getting on the Right Track

1. BULLYING Prevention:Getting on the Right Track Iredell-Statesville Schools

2. Consensogram • How much do you know about bullying and what to do about it?

3. Bullying Prevention Agenda • Review/Identify requirements of Senate Bill 526 • Define what bullying and cite age appropriate examples for each type • Discuss strategies to prevent bullying behavior within your school • Discuss Intervention Strategies when bullying occurs • Review contents of the ISS Bullying Policy • Define how, when, why staff will communicate bullying issues to parents • Define School-Wide plan for educating all students on Bullying Policy • Provide activities/instructional ideas for teaching students

4. Senate Bill 526 States schools “shall develop and implement methods and strategies for promoting school environments that are free of bullying or harassing behavior.” • Defines bullying and harassment • Mandates schools to have a policy against bullying or harassing behavior • Mandates information regarding this policy shall be incorporated into a school’s employee training program.

5. Activity #1: Bullying Quiz Answer the following bullying quiz questions with your Team Exploring the Nature and Prevention of BullyingBullying Quiz (http://www.k12coordinator.org/onlinece/onlineevents/bullying/bullying_quiz.htm)

6. Bullying Quiz • Bullying is just a part of growing up. The effects of bullying on victims are short-term and minor.a) True b) False 2. Bullying is not a serious problem for the bullies; they eventually grow out of this behavior. a) True b) False 3. Most bullying occurs in high school because older students are more confident and willing to pick on others. a) True b) False 4. Bullying is usually verbal, not physical, in nature. a) True b) False

7. Bullying Quiz 5. Bullies are usually insecure loners with low self-esteem.a) True b) False 6. Bullying is almost exclusively male behavior.a) True b) False 7. Bullies don’t usually pick on passive students; instead, they bully in response to some sort of provocation from their victims.a) True b) False 8. A bully usually attacks when no one else is watching.a) True b) False

8. Bullying Quiz 9. Most bullying happens at school. a) True b) False 10. Targets of bullies tend to be children with physical differences.a) True b) False 11. If students would just fight back, then bullies would leave them alone.a) True b) False 12. Hanging out with other students increases the risks of being bullied since there are more people for bullies to target. a) True b) False

9. Why Educators Should be Concerned • State of North Carolina is concerned: • Center for the Prevention of School Violence defines school violence as “any behavior that violates a school’s educational mission or climate of respect or jeopardizes the intent of the school to be free of aggression against persons or property, drugs, weapons, disruptions, and disorder.” • NC Safe Schools Initiative recognizes that bullying prevention is crime prevention. www.djjdp.org

10. Healthy, Safe, Orderly and Caring • State Goals: • Learning environments inviting and supportive of high student performance • Schools free of controlled and illegal substances and all harmful behavior • Adequate, safe education facilities that support high student performance

11. Bullying: Some Disturbing Data • Of 41 school shooters studies by the Secret Service and the U.S. Department of Education, two-thirds felt persecuted, bullied, threatened, attacked, or injured before the school shooting, with many having been the victims of “longstanding and severe bullying and harassment.” (www.gothamgazette.com/pring/1416)

12. Bullying: Some Disturbing Data • A 2001 study of students in 8th through 11th grades by the American Association of University Women Educational Foundation found that “four of five students – boys and girls – report that they have experienced some type of sexual harassment at school” (www.gothamgazette.com/pring/1416)

13. Bullying: Some Disturbing Data • A Los Angeles study of 192 sixth-graders concluded that almost half had been bullied at least once during a five-day period. (www.gothamgazette.com/pring/1416)

14. Bullying and the Workplace • Workplace bullying - in any form - is bad for business. It destroys teamwork, commitment and morale." Tony Morgan, Chief Executive, The Industrial Society • Consider the effect of bullying in group-centered work at school.

15. Bullying Defined • Double I-R Criteria: • Intentional • Imbalanced • Repeated

16. Bullying Defined • Bullying is INTENTIONAL: deliberate hurtful purposeful instrumental goal-directed

17. Bullying Defined • Bullying is IMBALANCED: physical vs. psychological actual vs. perceived

18. Power Imbalance • “A power imbalance is found at the heart of the bullying dynamic. A student who is stronger, more aggressive, bolder, and more confident than average typically bullies other students who are weaker, more timid, and who tend not to retaliate or act in an assertive manner.” (Centre for Children and Families in the Justice System)

19. Bullying Defined • Bullying is REPEATED: one-time aggression vs. bullying

20. Bullying Defined • Bullying involves a desire to hurt + hurtful action + a power imbalance + (typically) repetition + an unjust use of power + evident enjoyment by the aggressor and a sense of being oppressed on the part of the victim. http://www.education.unisa.edu.au/bullying/define.html

21. Bullying Defined • “A student is being bullied or victimized when he or she is exposed, repeatedly and over time, to negative actions on the part of one or more other students… It is a negative action when someone intentionally inflicts, or attempts to inflict injury or discomfort on another.” Olweus, 1994, p. 1173

22. Bullying Behavior: 4 Categories • Physical • Verbal • Social/Relational • Sexual Harassment

23. Bullying Behavior: 4 Categories • 1. PHYSICAL BULLYING Can leave marks on the body

24. Bullying Behavior: 4 Categories • 2. VERBAL BULLYING Can be heard by the target

25. Bullying Behavior: 4 Categories • 3. SOCIAL/RELATIONAL BULLYING Indirect, covert attempts to affect the target’s reputation or social standing

26. Bullying Behavior: 4 Categories • 3. SOCIAL/RELATIONAL BULLYING Indirect, covert attempts to affect the target’s reputation or social standing

27. Cyberbullying: An ethical Impact • Why is this so dangerous? “The anonymityof online communications means kids feel freer to do things online they would never do in the real world. Even if they can be identified online, young people can accuse someone else of using their screen name. They don’t have to own their actions, and if a person can’t be identified with and action, fear of punishment is diminished.” (www.media-awareness.ca/english/resources/special_initiatives/wa_resources/wa_shar)

28. Bullying Behavior: 4 Categories • 4.SEXUAL HARASSMENT (SH) - Any repeated, unwanted behavior of a sexual nature perpetrated upon one individual by another. Sexual harassment may be verbal, visual, written, or physical. It can occur between people of different genders or those of the same sex. Harassing behaviors may occur in a variety of relationships including those among peers, and those where there is an imbalance of power between two individuals. The law is primarily concerned with the impact of the behavior, not the intent. In other words, the law is concerned with how the person on the receiving end is affected by the behavior, not with what the other person means by the behavior. http://www.turnaroundinc.org/pages/facts/glossary.html

29. Bias Incidents/Hate Crimes • Bias incidents are any acts directed against people or property that are motivated by prejudice based on race, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender, social affiliation, ability or appearance. Responding to Hate at School Tolerance Magazine, 1999

30. Gender Differences and Bullying GIRLS: Bully within social group Covert Emphasis on verbal and social/relational bullying

31. Gender Differences and Bullying BOYS: • Bully outside social group • Direct • More likely to use physical aggression

32. Activity #2: Scenario Review • With your Teacher-training Team, read the scenario at your table and determine: • Is this an example of bullying? If so, answer the following: • Determine how you know the act was intentional. • What is/are the imbalance(s)? • What clues indicate this is repetitive behavior?

33. Bullying is… • Peer Abuse • An Act of Violence • Precursor to Escalated Acts of Violence and Crime • Serial Abuse

34. Statistics • 285,000 students are physically attacked each month • 160,000children miss school each day because of fear • 70% of students have been bullied during their academic career • 14% of students believe that bullying has a severe impact on their lives

35. Prevalence • 15% of students in schools involved • 9% are targets • 7% bully others repeatedly • More victims in younger grades are victimized • Boys are more likely to bully than girls (Centre for Children and Families in the Justice System)

36. List of Facts • 80% of adolescents reported being bullied during their school years • 90% of 4th through 8th graders report being targets of bullying • 15% of students bully regularly or are targets of bullying • Up to 7% of 8th grade students stay home at least once a month because of bullies http://lincoln.midcoast.com/~wps/against/bullying.html

37. List of Facts • Bullies identified by age eight are six times more likely to be convicted of a crime by age twenty-four and five times more likely than non-bullies to end up with serious criminal records by the age of thirty. • Students reported that 71% of the teachers or other adults in the classroom ignored bullying incidents. http://lincoln.midcoast.com/~wps/against/bullying.html

38. List of Facts • When asked students uniformly expressed the desire that teachers intervene rather than ignore teasing and bullying. • Aggressive behavior is learned early and becomes resistant to change if it persists beyond age eight. • Bullying most often occurs at school where there is minimal or no supervision. http://lincoln.midcoast.com/~wps/against/bullying.html

39. List of Facts • Most bullying is verbal. • Bullying begins in elementary school, peaks in middle school, diminishes but does not disappear in high school. • Both boys and girls bully, usually same sex classmates, with female bullying taking indirect, manipulative forms. • Bullying can have devastating long term effects on the targets. http://lincoln.midcoast.com/~wps/against/bullying.html

40. Did You Know? • By 6 weeks into the school year, the bully-target patterns have been established. • Physical bullying increases through the elementary years and peaks in middle school. Thereafter, incidents decrease with age. • Verbal bullying occurs throughout school years. • Children do not tell on bullies because they are afraid it will get worse. They feel no one can help them if they do. (From Bullying Behaviors: A Systemic PerspectivePowerpoint Presentation Dr. Andy Horne, University of Georgia, April 2005)

41. What Can Schools Do to Help? • “While approaches that simply crack down on individual bullies are seldom effective, when there is school-wide commitment to end bullying, it can be reduced up to 50%.” (www.safeyouth.org/scripts/teens/bullying.asp)

42. Prevention Basics • Solution-focused approach • Define the problem and develop strategies to solve the problem – strength, ownership, competency, empowerment, coaching • Develop Positive School Climate: • Increase rapport with students • Establish positive, respectful climate

43. Family Lack of supervision Lack of attachment Negative relationship Lack of discipline/consequence Support for violence School Lack of supervision Lack of attachment Negative relationship Lack of discipline/consequence Support for violence Lack of alternatives to violence Family/School Risk Factors (From Bullying Behaviors: A Systemic Perspective Powerpoint Presentation Dr. Andy Horne, University of Georgia, April 2005)

44. Teacher Beliefs that Reduce Bullying • “Students are situational learners and adapt to learning at home and school differently.” • “If I provide the opportunity to learn positive behaviors, they can learn and maybe transfer those to home.” • “Bullying really is more likely to happen at school.” • “Not all bullies use physical force.” • “Being mean, teasing, and shunning behaviors are alternate forms of bullying.” (From Bullying Behaviors: A Systemic Perspective Powerpoint Presentation Dr. Andy Horne, University of Georgia, April 2005)

45. Maintain Many ignore victimization Don’t intervene unless problem is significant Blame the victim Focus only on extinguishing Support victim only the immediate aftermath Reduce Demonstrate awareness Take action at all levels Teach how not to be good targets Provide follow-up support Teacher Activities that Maintain or Reduce Victimization (From Bullying Behaviors: A Systemic Perspective Powerpoint Presentation Dr. Andy Horne, University of Georgia, April 2005)

46. When we notice it happening… Senate Bill 526 states a school employee, student, or volunteer who has witnessed or has reliable information that a student or employee has been subject to any act of bullying or harassing behavior shall report the incident to the appropriate school official. (ISS defines school official as an Administrator)

47. Bullying Consequence Matrix • Review Consequences Matrix Elementary Middle High

48. Procedures for Reporting- REVIEW Policy Code: 4021

49. Develop a District & School-wide Agenda • Training • Assessment – bullying survey/map • Data Analysis: Healthy, Safe, Orderly & Caring Committee • Proactive Prevention basics • Teach expectations • Model positive, consistent behavior • Visual displays (posters, criteria, etc) • Enforce policy • Intervention Strategies

50. Identify Scope of the Problem • School-wide assessment • Bullying survey to all students after training • Anonymous but color-coded for grade level identification • 3 components (true/false, map/bus, open-ended) • You may choose to stagger the training by grade level so that analysis is more manageable • Empty map for students to identify places where bullying takes place in your school