Bully Prevention

CHARACTERplus is one of the key forces in bully prevention in the St. Louis Region, sponsoring the NEA Bullying and Sexual Harassment Prevention/Intervention Workshops since 2004, learning from national experts, and delivering traiing to schools throughout the state. More than 500 educators have participated in two-day training sessions since 2004. They serve school in 47 districts. Using the research-based Olweus model, the approach involves a school leadership team including administration, teachers, counselors and parents. It focuses on

common definitions for bullying and harassment,

facts vs. myths,

well-designed and well-communicated policies,

anonymous student surveys to determine the extent of bullying,

"hot spots" analyses of school buildings

lessons in recognizing bully behaviors, empathy, safe confrontation, conflict de-escalation and strategies for bystanders. We have two more on the calendar for this school year. The work of Christine Guinther, Vice President of the Missouri NEA, and the dedicated educators who are now trained have catapulted Missouri to top of on the list of states that have developed their own cadres.

Below is a snapshot of what is happening in some of the districts and schools who sent their educators to the training. We’ve only scratched the surface of what is going on. If you would like add your school’s efforts, please send a paragraph to Diane Stirling • 314.692.9722 • dstirling@csd.org

Belleville #118, Fox, Francis Howell, Hazelwood, Lindbergh, Meramec Valley, Parkway, Pattonville, Riverview Gardens, Rockwood, Special, St. Charles and Wentzville sent between five and 23 educators to workshops in January 2004, April 2004 and September 2004. Participants totaled 225 from 32 districts.

Jefferson Elementary’s team from Belleville #118 used time during the second day of the NEA workshop to plan building-wide initiatives under the banner “Bully Free is the way to be.” Together they outlined a year of weekly student sessions, class meeting topics and “home-work.” Their version of “home-work” is a question that goes home once a week with each student to be discussed with parents, answered in print, and returned. Early last school year, a “home-work” assignment asked “What makes you feel welcome and unwelcome at school?” When several described name-calling and exclusion, the student body talked about it in a school-wide class meeting. They shared what happens, how it makes them feel, and what they could do to make Jefferson a more welcoming place.

Phil Milligan, assistant principal, Bryan Middle School, Francis Howell District, can talk from experience about what it takes to gain the trust of students. They have to know two things: (1) that they can report and remain anonymous and (2) their reports, when truthful, will lead to real change for the better. Bryan students trust the system he put in place.

Four students at McKinley Classical Junior Academy, St. Louis Public Schools, reported to 30 members of the faculty the results of their “Hot Spots” survey. The “Hot Spots” exercise is recommended by the NEA program. They gave insight into not only where incidents happened, but why.

Principals from Fox School District’s 17 schools attended the April workshop. Six returned for further training and formed a cadre that trained teams in every building. These teams in turn trained their communities—faculty, parents, support staff. Yearlong efforts culminated in a district-wide Student Summit on Bullying, involving one representative for every 100 students from all schools (grades 5-12). They talked candidly about what happened and still happens, but they confirmed undeniably that their schools were addressing the issue and it was making a difference. They’ll take a post-survey this year to provide a statistical measure of the impact.

At Fox High School, awareness was heightened as teachers watched the movie “Bang, Bang, You’re Dead.” As they left the showing in silence, they were given the results of a student survey on bullying in their school. It mobilized the faculty and inspired the student production of a play by the same name later in the year. Students led discussion sessions following the showings.

Four Parkway schools sent teams to the NEA training. At another level, the District’s Discipline and Diversity Review Committee took student responses to a periodic climate survey seriously. One of the 17 standards in a discipline policy developed from their recommendations warns that comments or actions that belittle another’s personal appearance, sexual orientation, race, disability, color, religion, national origin, gender, or socio-economic status may be classified as hate crimes. Personal appearance and sexual orientation were added because they came up repeatedly in response to survey questions about the nature of bullying and harassment.

In Hazelwood, Karen Helms and ten colleagues attended the Train the Trainer session in August. They’ve organized September workshops for principals from the district’s 27 schools in one session and all counselors in another.

Rockwood committed two of their educators—Jill Mueth and Cathy Westbury— as professional trainers, joining Chris Guinther, MNEA Vice President. The district-wide character education team made it a top priority at their planning session in early 2004. They strategized with Superintendent Robert Malito. LaSalle Springs and Rockwood Valley Middle Schools trained their entire staff and school community.