Taking On Bullying: Part 2

New Attitudes, Strategies Take Hold

Story by Anna Oakes

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Four years ago, a flash of orange was a welcome sign to students who had been silently suffering at Watauga High.

James Carp and fellow members of the Diversity Club found that of the biggest problems for students at the school was bullying and teasing—and not having anyone to talk to about it.

“When I was at Watauga High School, there were very few teachers whom a couple of kids were comfortable talking to,” Carp said. Even worse, “there were some teachers who were known as people who would stick up for students who were bullying or who said homophobic or racist things,” he said.

In response, the club developed a program called Open Arms. They raised money to order bright orange silicone bracelets and distributed them to students who would sign a contract promising to be a friendly ear to students in need.

"People who were being bullied or having a hard time and needed some help would know that they could come talk to you," Carp said. About 100 students signed up to wear the bracelets, and the program raised a lot of awareness, he said. The program lasted only a year, however, as most of the Diversity Club members graduated.

The Diversity Club's project, though short-lived, is but one example of new attitudes and strategies on bullying beginning to take hold in the region. From the state to local schools to community groups, more people are taking a proactive approach toward the issue.


North Carolina's School Violence Prevention Act
On June 30, North Carolina signed into law the School Violence Prevention Act (SVPA), joining 39 other states that had already passed laws on bullying. The bill narrowly passed the General Assembly with a vote of 26-22 in the Senate and 58-57 in the House of Representatives.

The new law requires all public school systems in the state to adopt policies against bullying before December 31, 2009, and establish consequences and remedial action for students who bully. The act also requires schools to report acts of bullying, to develop procedures for anonymous reports and to prohibit retaliation against anyone who reports the offense.

Conservatives took issue with the bill’s inclusion of “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” in a list of a dozen “differentiating characteristics” that could motivate bullying behavior, which also includes race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, socioeconomic status, academic status, gender, physical appearance and disability. The same controversy stymied a similar bill during the 2007 session. It’s the first time the state has recognized sexual orientation and gender identity as protected groups.

Rep. Cullie Tarleton (D-93), who represents Watauga and Ashe counties, was one of four primary sponsors of the House bill. The bill went beyond typical school policies on bullying by enumerating that list of characteristics, Tarleton said.

“If children fall under one of these [characteristics], they are more likely than others to be bullied,” he explained. “At the end of the day, every child in this country is a child of God, and they deserve to be protected.

“It put the state board and school systems across the state on notice,” he said. “If we hear that that is not being done, we’ll make sure that the people responsible are dealt with in an appropriate manner.”

Rep. Phillip Frye (R-84), who represents Avery, Caldwell, Mitchell and Yancey counties, opposed the bill. Instead, he favored a Republican version, House Bill 776, which did not list differentiating characteristics or subgroups.

“We wanted it to say there will be no bullying, period. That’s as plain as we could make it on this bill,” he said. “I don’t think any group should be singled out and named.”

Watauga Country resident Kathy Staley has been a voice against bullying ever since her high school friend in Wilkes County was bullied to the point that he dropped out of school and ran away from home.

“Although the law’s lack of funding and explicit guidelines for training is problematic, the School Violence Prevention Act is a step in the right direction,” Staley said. “Studies show that students from states with laws that delineate protected groups report less bullying, presumably because it empowers the teachers and administrators to be proactive.”

Retired Watauga High School teacher Nanci Tolbert Nance said the new law is not enough to bring about change.

“Regulations are only effective to a degree,” Nance said. “It helps to have the regulations to justify official responses to bullying, but when students are afraid to report it, peers encourage it, parents allow it, educators on any level see it and let it go, the community doesn’t act to stop it, and adults anywhere model it, then all the legislation in the world means nothing.”


Local Policies on Bullying
“I don’t think it’s going to have much effect here,” said Watauga High School counselor Candis Walker, speaking about the SVPA. “Locally, we have had an anti-bullying policy for a while,” Walker said, adding that she thinks it is more comprehensive than the new state law.

The Watauga County Board of Education adopted a policy on “Anti-Bullying, Harassment, and Discrimination” in March 2005. The policy defines bullying behaviors, directs schools to integrate awareness about bullying into character education and anti-violence curricula, designates the principal as the person responsible for reporting and documenting bullying acts in the annual Discipline Data Collection Report and requires schools to notify parents and students about the policy on at least two occasions during the school year.

“Safety is always the top priority in our schools,” said Dr. Marty Hemric, in his second year as Watauga County Schools superintendent. “For us to develop policies…those alone cannot mandate positive behaviors.”

Hemric said he feels the Watauga policy is more specific in listing bullying behaviors than the SVPA, which he said leaves a lot of room for interpretation. The Student Services Committee will meet to modify the Watauga policy to bring it in line with the new law, which includes listing the characteristics outlined by lawmakers.

“I think it’s a good thing to add to the policy,” Hemric said. The superintendent said he hopes to have the policy ready to present to the school board in October.

“We’re not going to diminish the policy that we already have. We will continue at the district level, through schools, to augment, accentuate and refine our efforts,” Hemric said. “Will this [new law] cause us to bring about anything brand new? Not at this point.”

The Avery County Board of Education first adopted a policy on bullying in 2000, with revisions in 2005 and 2008, said Diane Jaynes, Avery County Schools assistant superintendent.

The policy defines bullying and harassing behaviors, establishes procedures for complaints about bullying, prohibits retaliation against reporters of bullying and directs the superintendent to designate an employee to receive anti-bullying. The superintendent is required to maintain records of bullying reports and submit them to the state.

Jaynes said the district will revise the policy again to comply with the new state law.


Reporting the Act, Measuring the Problem
At an anti-bullying workshop at the Boone Unitarian Universalist Fellowship on September 11, one woman said she knew of a child who was bullied so frequently by another girl that her mother took her out of school and home-schooled her for a semester. Another attendee, a parent, said that her children were bullied because they were outsiders—the family had relocated several times.

Staley said she had recently found out about a friend in Watauga County who had been beaten up by schoolmates to the point that he was bleeding.

In a recent survey at Avery Middle School, 20 percent of students said bullying was a huge problem at the school, 19 percent reported it was a big problem, 51 percent reported it was somewhat of a problem and 10 percent said bullying was not a problem at all.

Bullying is happening in local schools, but it doesn’t always get reported.

“I think kids put up with it a lot, and just live with it and don’t really take any action,” said Walker. “They don’t want to be seen as the tattletale, the narc, until they’ve had their limit and can’t deal with it anymore. That’s when we have kids who lose control, or do something on a personal level.”

Children often do not want to report bullying because they fear retaliation.

“The target typically does not want to tell because it might make it worse,” Irwin said. Sometimes, the victims of bullying may not know who the bullyers are.

“Name-calling often occurs within a large group during class changes, and the targets cannot identify the bullyers,” Staley said.

School bullying statistics may under-represent or underestimate the problem because many adults, including educators, consider most verbal bullying tactics as normal and harmless, according to a 2001 article published in the American Educational Research Journal titled “Bullying and Being Bullied: To What Extent Are Bullies Also Victims?”

Or, like the students, they fear their interference could exacerbate the situation.

“Teachers are reluctant to report bullying because it’s very difficult to prove, and because sometimes the consequences are unintended. Sometimes to report bullying makes things worse,” Nance said. “Teachers are expected to do everything, but they’re not exactly trained to do everything.”

Most administrators will back up teachers who attempt to address bullying, but in the past, some haven’t been supportive of teachers, said one retired teacher. The teacher, who requested anonymity because she continues to reside locally, said, “I have heard of teachers who would talk to administrators about a certain problem, and they sort of laughed it off.”

And bullying often takes place away from adult supervision—in bathrooms, hallways and other areas.

Schools have been slow to fully comply with a State Board of Education (SBE) policy—SS-A-07, adopted in July 2004—that requires every school district to investigate, document and report all acts of bullying and harassment.

“The SBE policy dates back to 2004, but it was not clearly communicated to the [school districts] until the middle of the 2006-07 school year,” said Ken Gattis, senior research and evaluation coordinator for the N.C. Department of Public Instruction, in an email to Clarissa Schmal, student services director for Watauga County Schools.

In school year 2006-07, Watauga County Schools—which currently has an enrollment of 4,500 students—reported one act of bullying, followed by three reported acts in 2007-08. In 2008-09, the reported acts of bullying increased to 45. Schmal, who like Hemric, is new to her position, said she was uncertain about the reason for the spike in reporting.

“Our gut tells us that as with any new mandate to more specifically report data, it took a while for administrators to get comfortable with labeling an incident one way versus another,” she said. “After the new law, I will personally be responsible for tracking that data and keeping it.”

Jaynes could not access data for 2008-09 as of press time, but in 2007-08, Avery County Schools reported five acts of bullying.

“The challenge with quantifying bullying is that there hasn’t been surveys throughout all of North Carolina to determine what the levels are. Until that’s done, we’re not going to know what we’re facing and how it compares to other counties or states,” Staley said.

But Irwin says that too much emphasis is placed on reporting bullying, rather than preventing it.

“The reporting of it is not what decreases bullying,” she said. “It’s the community, the climate—that’s the way to go.”


What Are Local Schools Doing?
Some schools are going beyond routine consequences for bullying and proactively addressing the issue.

Avery Middle School Assistant Principal Frank Taylor said he has adopted the issue of bullying as his personal project for the year. Last year, the school invited Rick Spurling from Mitchell County to speak with students and faculty.

Spurling is assistant superintendent of Mitchell County Schools and a leader on the bullying issue who frequently gives presentations about anti-bullying programs. After the program, a teacher approached Taylor and said Spurling did a good job, “but one person is not going to change anything.”

In response to Spurling’s presentation and to the new state law, Taylor has integrated focused readings and discussions on topics related to bullying during every Wednesday homeroom period. He also rewards good deeds—one student who helped break up a fight received free ice cream for a week.

“The nice thing is, teachers are buying into it, a lot of the kids are buying into it, and that’s a good thing,” he said.

Four schools in Watauga County—Green Valley, Parkway Elementary, Watauga High School and Blowing Rock Elementary—have implemented the Positive Behavior Support (PBS) program. The program requires a year of training for staff and three to five years to fully implement.

“PBS is a combination of strategies designed to teach and encourage respectful, responsible behaviors while using data to continuously support decision making,” said Cindy Brown, program coordinator. “It is a general approach to preventing problem behavior that is closely linked to safe schools and character education. Prevention is the key. Bullying can be prevented by teaching students what is expected and how to deal with bullying behavior—early.”

At Hardin Park Elementary, fifth grade students participate in a semester-long program on bullying led by Irwin, who serves as counselor for grades 5 through 8. Students receive instruction every other week on conflict management, recognizing bullying behaviors and strategies for dealing with bullying.

Irwin said that as students who participated in the program have reached the eighth grade, school leaders have observed a noticeable decline in bullying at Hardin Park. In addition, a school presentation on bullying for parents will take place on Wednesday, September 30.

Several years ago, Spurling completed his doctoral dissertation on an anti-bullying program that he implemented in five Western North Carolina schools. As a result of the program, attendance improved, test scores increased and acts of aggression dramatically decreased—all within one year of implementing the program, he said.

“It was amazing,” Spurling said.

Since then, Spurling adapted his dissertation into a book, It Is Time…To Be Bully Free! An Anti-Bullying Guidebook for School Leaders, and has presented his anti-bullying strategies to thousands of people over the past five years. Many schools have adopted his anti-bullying programs.


Strategies for Prevention & Intervention
While many people worry about whether bullying is being reported, “the most important thing is to build a caring community,” Irwin said. “It’s really larger than the schools—it’s a community issue.”

Modeling the proper behavior is very important, she said. Adults should be mindful of whether they are acting as bullies—actions that children will imitate.

“Appreciating difference and being tolerant is a real critical part of developing the school climate,” Irwin said. “It's more than just tolerating the differences, it really is also celebrating the differences.”

Spurling said that adult intervention in bullying “has to be the No. 1 priority. When kids are aware that we know, a lot of times it stops the behavior.” Sometimes parents are reluctant to intervene, but it "rarely, rarely makes it worse," Irwin said.

"Parents should always feel like they can go to the school—not to jump on somebody—but go to the school and tell their concerns," said La Verne Franklin, a retired teacher.

The most common misconceptions about bullying are that the solutions lie with the victims or with the bullyers, said Annette Green, who led the anti-bullying workshop at the Boone Unitarian Universalist Fellowship earlier this month.

Some people say that it’s up to the victim to either stand up to or ignore the bullying.

“That’s really unfair,” Green said, because it puts more pressure on the person who is already suffering. Attempting to sit the bullying child down and reason with them to be more empathetic can also be ineffective, she said.

Instead, the most potential for change lies with the bystanders—the children who perpetuate bullying by either remaining silent or encouraging the bully’s behavior with laughter or other signs of approval. These are “the people we can most affect and empower,” Green said. Once the bully loses his or her audience, the primary motivation for the behavior is gone.

“The bystanders need to be able to speak up,” she said. “They can be taught to do that.”

Irwin agrees that the most important way to combat bullying is to encourage student peers, or bystanders, to step in and become allies—a point that is emphasized at Hardin Park.

"We didn't know that a few years ago," she said.

Student Strategies for Dealing with Bullying

1. Yell to attract attention from adults (not in class)
2. Have confident body language
3. Use assertive words
4. Tell an adult
5. Stand up for the victim—don’t be a bystander; be an ally!

*Adapted from Cheryl Irwin, Hardin Park Elementary

Resources

The following resources are available to students, parents, teachers and community members interested in learning more about bullying and ways to prevent it. Some sites include special activities and videos designed especially for kids.

Olweus Bullying Prevention Program
www.olweus.org

Southern Poverty Law Center
www.TeachingTolerance.org

Dr. Rick Spurling’s Bully-Free Program
www.bullyfreezone.info

Stop Bullying Now!
www.stopbullyingnow.hrsa.gov/kids  

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