CourierPostOnline - South Jersey's Web Site Sunday, September 18, 2005 Teamwork can bring bullying to its knees In schools, everyone has a role CHRIS LaCHALL and JOYCE WILLIAMS/Courier-Post The Courier-Post Editorial Department's anti-bullying community meeting Aug. 16 at the University of Medicine and Dentistry in Stratford opened with the play "No One Seems to Care," mostly written by and starring students from Delsea Regional High School in Franklin Township. The play illustrates that bullying affects all of us as it shows the emotional trials of a victim who suffers at school, can't be helped by her parents and contemplates suicide.For more information or to look into whether the play can be presented for your school or community, contact Margie Glick at msg57@comcast.net with subject line "Play." Cast and authors of the play include: Evan Glick, Laura Devlin, Natalie Rambone, Laureen Price, Emily Wurster, Alison Allen, Courtney Grochowski, Tom Abruzzo, Sarah DiFazio, Brittany Coker, Byron Simmons, Desiree Dare, Jordan Pace, Alyssa Denneney, Joe Pepitone, Margie Glick and Joe Valentino. Stop The Bullying: Making Schools Safe For All Parents' responsibility: Take the lead for kids About this series A sampling of South Jersey schools' anti-bullying policies Additional resources A growing crisis in schools "If you're being picked on, it's going to get worse before it gets better. But if you don't tell anyone, it's only going to get worse." Laura Devlin, 17, Franklinville "Basically, what teachers should be doing is watching." Danielle Walls, 13, Camden "They (teachers) concentrate too much on gum-chewing, stealing and other things when I think bullying is a bigger problem." Scott Forman, 13, Winslow Sunday, September 18, 2005 There's no excuse for adults' failure to address bullying, but kids see it happen all the time. At one time, dealing with school bullies was almost as much an accepted childhood rite as learning to ride a bike. Whether it's psychological -- exclusion, rumor-spreading and name-calling -- or physical -- pushing kids into lockers, stealing their books and beating them up -- bullying is flat-out wrong. And, despite what some may think, it is not something that's OK because it "toughens kids up." Bullying hurts deeply. It can lead to decreased academic performance, depression, self-mutilation and suicide. In bullies, it ingrains aggressive and anti-social behaviors that can lead to abusive work and family relationships and ending up in jail as adults. All New Jersey schools must have a policy in place to prevent bullying by virtue of a state law that went into effect two years ago. State leaders wisely recognized that all children deserve the opportunity to learn in a safe and caring environment. And such environments can be achieved. To do it, schools must fully commit to stop bullying. School staff, including teachers, administrators, aides, bus drivers and other staff members, must reinforce themes such as empathy and understanding every day through policies, the curriculum and their actions. They must be trained to look for the signs of bullying and intervene to stop it. They must gain the trust of students so they will feel comfortable reporting bullies to adults. And they must teach students to stand up and object when they see other kids bullying or being bullied. Students from across South Jersey say they want schools free of bullies. More so, they have specific suggestions for how their schools and others can better prevent bullying. School officials in South Jersey should strongly consider these ideas from students and experts. Horror stories For Eva Schmid, 14, of Haddon Township, fifth grade was the worst year of her life. Schmid found herself new to Haddon Township and in a new school, tiny Jennings Elementary School, where there was just one class in each grade. At first, Schmid thought her classmates, who had been together since kindergarten, might accept her. Some of the girls even came to her house for sleep-overs. But she wasn't accepted. Schmid's classmates wrote things about her on the blackboard. They made fun of her weight and called her "butterball turkey." The girls who had slept over at her house revealed secrets from her diary and even brought it to school one day. They also laughed through one episode when their teacher tried to admonish their bullying behavior. Schmid was friendless in the class. Eventually, she started coming home for lunch and not going back to finish the day, according to her mother, Kate Schmid. She'd cry often and suffered depression. The next year, Schmid enrolled at a Catholic school. Still, she is sometimes tormented by former classmates. Once, some of the bullies threw cans and bottles at her dog. One of the girls once called and threatened to burn down her house. She says the group still brags to other kids about teasing her relentlessly. When one confronted her last her, she punched him in the nose. For Scott Forman, 13, of Winslow, the bullying came from one classmate starting in kindergarten. Forman's bully became more of a problem over the years. In sixth grade, the bully would often smack him over the head with a hard plastic folder. Then, in seventh grade, Forman clearly remembers the bus ride to school the day before his Bar Mitzvah. That day, the bully walked up to him and offered two jokes insulting Jewish people. Forman reacted by cursing and screaming at the bully. He said it took a considerable effort not to hit him. Danielle Walls, 13, of Camden wasn't even the victim last year when she spent seventh grade at Hatch Middle School in Camden. But the bullying at the school was so bad, she didn't want to go back. This year, she's attending the pre-kindergarten-through-eighth-grade Bonsall Elementary School, where she says the climate is much safer. At Hatch, Walls saw fights every day. About 45 percent of the kids at school were bullies, 45 percent were victims and 10 percent were bystanders, she said. The nonbullies -- smart kids, quiet kids and those who didn't wear the right clothes, among others -- would get pushed into lockers, tripped, have their seat pulled out from under them, be verbally teased and get beat up, she said. Walls knew one girl whose head was dunked into a toilet by a group of girls in the bathroom. The girl never returned to the school. Problem ignored One thing common to the stories of all three of these students is that they say adults at their schools either didn't notice the problem or failed to properly address it. Schmid said the principal at Jennings at the time was reluctant to acknowledge she was being bullied or do much about it. In Forman's case, he said it took his blowup following the jokes to get the bus driver to notice that he was being bullied. And in Walls' case, she said some teachers at Hatch, often bullied by students themselves, simply ignored the behavior or told children to fight back. "They blame the kids for not being so tough. They say, "Don't be a punk,' " Walls said. "Or they'll say, "They don't pay me enough to help you.' " Teachers at Hatch and throughout the Camden district are well aware of bullying as a problem and are trained on it frequently, said Monica Lewis, director of communications for the district. "We train our staff as best as possible to handle bullying." Solutions Students offer many suggestions for curbing bullying, suggestions many experts agree with. Some, including Schmid and Walls, want harsher punishments for those who bully. Others say schools need to have more adults around the school. Marlton Middle School sixth-grader Sam Student said teachers need to pay more attention to what goes on in the hallways. Forman said the buses and assemblies are where much of the bullying goes on at Winslow Middle School. He wishes the district would have volunteer or staff aides on school buses. Walls said the cafeteria and restrooms were places particularly bad for bullying. Cheryl Dunican-Hein, program director for the School-Based Family Support Program at the Diocese of Camden Catholic Charities, said schools ought to increase adult presence in the parts of the school that have less structure than the classroom. "It's important for schools to investigate reports of bullying fully," Dunican-Hein said. "If there's a report that a child is being picked on on the playground, (the school) should temporarily place more adults on the playground." Beyond simply having staff better positioned to spot bullying, students want teachers to care that it's going on. They want them to stop it and they want to be able to talk to them about it. "There are a lot of things teachers should be trained to look for," said Delsea High School senior Laura Devlin. "If teachers see (bullying), they need to give someone a heads up. They should tell other teachers so they can keep an eye on that student in their class." Devlin, 17, of Franklinville dealt with bullies as an elementary school student in Blackwood. At Delsea, one of her teachers noticed a change in her behavior and got her to admit to being bullied on the bus. Because of that, her bus assignment was changed and she no longer had to deal with the bullies. Forman echoes her advice: "A lot of teachers think if it's not their student, it's not their problem. . . . Teachers should be doing more." A poor attitude is something teachers, administrators and other adults in schools cannot have if they want to stop bullying, said David A. Levine, author of several books and articles on creating caring school environments. Levine works as a consultant with districts around the Northeast, including in Evesham, to help create that type of environment. "Kids need to see that the school is doing something about it and will follow up," Levine said. "There has to be a constant message of, "You are safe here. That (bullying) doesn't happen here.' " Among the efforts Levine encourages districts to make are repeated training for kids to teach them empathy and good social skills and training for school staff on what bullying is, how it hurts kids and how to spot it. Don't forget bystanders Equally important in the equation are children themselves, particularly the large majority in most schools who are bystanders to bullying. Psychologist Dan Olweus, one of the world's leading bullying researchers, has said only 10 percent to 15 percent of kids are bullies or victims at typical schools. The other 80 percent to 85 percent are witnesses. These witnesses must learn to object to bullying when they see it. "Teachers can't be there every second," said Laureen Price, 17, once a victim of bullies herself. "It's kind of up to the other kids to stop it. . . . I'll jump into random conversations if I hear somebody getting called names." Price, a senior at Delsea, is among a group of students there who takes part in No One Seems to Care, a play about the harmful effects of bullying. In the play, Price and fellow senior Natalie Rambone, 17, torment a classmate who becomes depressed and dies from an overdose of prescription medications. Other students who witness the girl being bullied do nothing to stop it. Experts say getting students to talk to each other and their teachers about bullying and to stand up for those who are being bullied can be the difference in changing a school's culture and dramatically decreasing bullying. Priscilla Taylor-Williams chairs Quaker studies at Moorestown Friends School. The pre-kindergarten-to-12th-grade private school places great emphasis on teaching kids from an early age to have empathy for others. The school also strives to foster an environment in which students constantly are encouraged to discuss issues with each other and adults. By working hard to break through kids' "culture of silence," Taylor-Williams said students at Moorestown Friends are more apt to come to teachers about problems such as bullying. They're also apt to discourage bullying among themselves. Taylor-Williams said when new students come to Moorestown Friends, students who've been at the school for awhile are quick to tell them that name-calling or teasing aren't accepted behaviors. Getting kids to speak up in this way is something all districts can and should do to address bullying, Taylor-Williams said. "If you knew there were four or five other kids willing to say something, you'd be more willing to stand up and say something," Taylor-Williams said. "You can impact the power structure just by speaking up." It takes effort "Schools should be safe and schools should be fun," Levine, the anti-bullying consultant, says. It's not enough for schools to simply have a teacher training once a year on bullying and a student code of conduct that says bullying isn't permitted. Everyone involved in education -- from teachers to counselors, bus drivers and every member of the school staff -- must be diligent, every day in looking for bullying and intervening when it happens, and in spotting the signs that a student is being bullied. And they must teach kids to stand up for themselves when they are being bullied and stand up for those they see being bullied. Copyright 2005 Courier-Post. Use of this site signifies your agreement to the Terms of Service (updated December, 2002).