Use Proven Models that Work With Young People: The Safe, Disciplined, and Drug-Free Schools Expert Panel lists Promising and Exemplary Programs that demonstrate a reduction in student acting out behavior. School districts that adopt programs that teach respect for others, inclusion of all, stopping bullying and put downs see the difference in their children. We don't have to reinvent the wheel, just polish it. The research is there to show school boards, administrator and teachers that programs do work to bring students together working cooperatively. The research shows that organized peer support systems in schools was effective in reducing some forms of bullying in schools. Research also shows that schools that train older pupils as counselors for younger children are successfully helping to stop bullyingalthough some boys may feel embarrassed to be seen as users of this approach.

The Safe and Drug Free School Programs website can be reached at www.ed.gov/offices/OESE/SDFS/. The International Association of Chief of Police has an informational site at www.theiacp.org/pubinfo/Research/ythvio.htm

Reclaim the Schools: Create a "We're all in this together." school climate. Words of disgust and contempt set up walls between people and destroy the self-esteem of both bully and victim. Sarcasm and hostility create an "us versus them" mentality. With concerted effort, administrators and student counsels at the school can encourage behaviors that emphasize kindness. Teach and demand civility and respect for all.

Children from the "in crowd" can show kindness by speaking to everyone while walking down the hall is cool. Popular children in the schools carry a lot of power that they typically do not use for the greater good for all. They can speak up against harassment to set school values of civility and respect to all. By starting in elementary school, children who are well liked by others can convince those who tease the nerds and underdeveloped kids to lay-off. A climate of caring, inclusion and pride in being a member of that school can be encouraged rather than emphasizing cliques and groups that exclude people.

Students value feedback from their fellow classmates more than from any other source. Peer counselors can be trained to listen to those who experience social problems. Students need a more mature friend who could listen and counteract the irrational thinking and despair that lead them down that singular path of violence. Instruct children on the true meaning of the word "friend" and help them expand their classes of friends. For example, having "bus stop buddies" could mean being friendly and inclusion of everyone at the bus stop, while recognizing that it does not mean that they are best friends.
Address the culture of brutality that starts to slip into the schools during the elementary years and grows year after year. Create slogans that say, "Violence is not a laughing matter. We are all in this together." Teach children that real men can be vulnerable and sensitive. Help the students see that the practice of using sarcasm and trading insults can escalate into name-calling and cruelty.

Train the Teachers How to Work with Bullying and the Resultant Pain: The child who plans to kill another human being typically gives signals that he needs help. Train teachers on how to work with conflictual children who resist authority and are defiant. Develop programs where school staff and volunteers learn listening skills and provide opportunities for young people to share feelings of being disenfranchised. Psychological research shows that disclosure of stress is associated with well-being, and increased self-esteem. See, "Prevention Children Do Not Have To Remain A Victim of Their Anger."

Insist Students Take Responsibility for Unacceptable Behavior: Minimize discipline techniques that emphasize guilt and punishment, which lead to students fuming and focusing on getting revenge. Maximize discipline, which encourages taking responsibility for one's actions and understanding one's behavior. Help children learn to feel good about cleaning up their acting out behavior. Most students want to do better. They do not have the tools to change, and are tremendously relieved when someone takes an interest in them and shows them what to do.

A recent Associated Press report of 12-school system headlined "School violence precautions futile." The article noted that three weeks after authorities installed full-time police officers and created crisis plans, there was another shooting. The article ends by saying that "Experts say it's not possible to eliminate the threat of school violence, but they believe that it can be minimized with increased security and other measures."

Break Into the False Self Esteem: What some people call good self esteem in young people, which is an over inflated view of one's self based on pride and arrogance, is actually false esteem. Rewarding any effort with indiscriminate praise brings about a false sense of standards. Unconditional reinforcement, which does is not contingent on good or excellent performance, has created children who think they are special for doing any kind of work at all. They feel that they are special and should get special privileges such as not having to do their work. Along with this is the inability to take criticism. Gang members, hardened criminals spousal abusers and bullies share this mindset of being above others and thus feel entitled to hurt them.

Children with false self-esteem develop defenses against being criticized, thus disavowing any negative feedback crucial to the learning process. Critical thinking skills and judging one's work with high expectations along with the teaching of humility, modesty and the ability to receive criticism without become deflated will help children prepare for the real world of relationships and work.


Take Student Pain and Threats of Violence Seriously: Get kids talking about their grievances before the anger and rage build up. Create peer counseling, conflict resolution and mediation programs. Identify the high-risk children and arrange for social support and mentoring by older responsible students. According to a recent newspaper report, the fourteen year old girl who shot a classmate said that she did it to make the victim "know her pain" as she had been called "idiot, stupid, fat, ugly, faggot, whatever."

Teach Assertiveness Training to Victim Kids and Empathy Skills to Children Who Bully and Anger Management to Everyone: Children who are hurt and children who hurt others are usually are different sides of the same coin but require somewhat different teachings. There are basic social skills that everyone needs to learn to function well in our society such as management of anger. The children who are bullied need to learn setting strong boundaries and coping with threat skills. The child who picks on others needs to learn respect, and the skill of putting himself in the victim's shoes. See, "Social Skills For Dealing With Anger."

Becoming a Heart Centered Nation: Examine and research the suggestions for discipline and management techniques made in discipline approaches that emphasize respect and taking responsibility for misbehavior. Children who are raised with discipline methods of being responsible for their own thoughts, attitudes and behaviors feel better about themselves and more connected to their fellow students. The necessary steps to becoming a fully functional human being include understanding ourselves, breaking into our learned ways of blaming others, and trying to control them through anger, withdrawal, and intimidation.

The Law of Correction says that Whoever Messes Up the Environment Must Clean it Up. Programs that stress logical, rational consequences for behavior teach important lessons about owning and changing one's behavior. For example, the child who spray paints graffiti on a building must apologize to the owner, clean the wall and repaint it. The concept of Overcorrection is doing more than just correcting the damage that has been done. An Overcorrection technique in this situation might be apologizing to each person in the neighborhood where the wall is and talking to other children about the importance of respecting the property of others. The discipline techniques of Correction and Overcorrection give the young person pause for cause regarding their inappropriate behavior.

Change the Meaning of "Snitching" and "Narcing:" Create an open system where everyone understands that it is absolutely necessary to report violence. The code of silence is strong in young people with allegiance to the peer group. Make a distinction between tattling and giving disturbing information that may help others by giving them examples when it is important to talk to an adult. Help students understand that reporting violence is absolutely necessary and it is not "snitching" or "narcing." Put the brunt of responsibility on the students themselves making the "human metal detectors."

Students can learn that it is necessary to notify proper authorities when there is implied harm to either self or others. This is a discrimination that can be taught and entered into the school culture. Clear guidelines, fully communicated to the students, would help decrease the conflict about reporting on other kids. Groups of children who hear threats can notify authorities, thus lessening the pressure on any one student. Laws can be passed that give monies for legal fees for any student whose parents are sued because they notify authorities.

Condone Bullying, Violence and Rejection of One Group by Another: Societies that condone violent behavior allow it to happen. School districts that have a zero violence policy that is stressed to the children will have fewer children who become violent. The effects of speaking out and standing up to abuse can help change the social conditions that support it. Professor Dan Olweus of the University of Bergen developed a countrywide program of stopping bullying in Norway. As a result of the teacher training, and a nationwide campaign, bullying decreased and a friendlier culture developed. Schools can teach programs that emphasize friendship building, honesty, tolerance and compassion for those less fortunate.

Bring in New Models for Decreasing Prejudice and Conflict: Curriculums can be enriched to teach moral values of respect, courtesy, tolerance, social responsibility and values clarification. Teaching children perspective taking, decision making, integrating different views and critical thinking will help create a climate of cooperation and caring. Social problems can be examined from the perspective of W. Ryan's classic book, Blaming the Victim. We can help students challenge the "us" versus "them" mentality wherever it pops up.

The YWCA in Tucson, AZ has launched "It's Time to Talk" campaign that brings people from all walks of life. People with different skin colors laud this program as raising awareness of the experiences of those different from them. Churches, workplaces and social service agencies sponsor these low cost discussion groups for "Unlearning Racism." Some college courses assign these workshops as part of their course work. The American Friends church sponsors ongoing trainings on conflict negotiation that teach people the necessary skills of getting along with others when there is friction and controversy.

Teacher Tolerance Magazine offers a free magazine to teachers, religious and community leaders, health-care providers and other educators at http://www.splcenter.org/cgi-bin/goframe.pl?refname=/teachingtolerance/tt-1.html

There are hundreds of fine programs that have been developed to address the attitudes of disrespect and ruthlessness that have crept into our society. We need to be made aware of what programs is available.

Finding Balance in These Times of Stress: We live in a stressful world. Many people today have lives that are out of balance. The fast pace of life that young people are subjected to, that all of us fall victim of, lead to more and more stress? Schedules are fully packed. Fast is infeverish activity, the chase for the latest fad, fast food, the latest gossip or world crisis. The fast lane life creates more tension, problems with depression, and loss of meaning and disorder sleep. The cumulative effect of the intense stimulation that young people face now builds up. Children who have been harassed by others feel a unique form of stress and pain.

And what do young people who feel bad about themselves do to relax? Being cut off from their peers and school activities, they do not usually have a repertoire of healthy ways to reduce tension. They turn to action movies featuring violence or to video games of shooting and blowing things up. Some young people, bored, with seeing and doing it all before, seek more exciting activities. A few feel proud about their ability to shock people. Revealing clothes, dirtier language, brazen sexuality and values that promote ruthlessness are the order of the day.

The vulnerable years of Junior and Senior High School are times of hormonal shifts, mood swings and high emotionality. Prolonged tension and stress disrupts the body's natural chemistry creating stress related illness, acting out behavior and the turning to harmful addictions. Help young people distinguish between healthy and harmful stress reduction techniques. Cutting of the body, sneaking cigarettes, turning to alcohol and drugs are examples of ways that young people are trying to self meditate their tension. Children who are not interested in sports and physical activities that reduce stress can be shown other ways to release their tension.

Teaching children the relaxation techniques, can have surprising health benefits. New research shows that deep relaxation practiced regularly can strengthen the immune system and promote good health and a calm mind. Educate children in stress reduction techniques such as deep breathing, mental imagery, Progressive Relaxation and the Emotional Freedom Technique. Instruct children on how to recognize when their friend is experiencing pressure so they can take a "stress release break" together. Young people are grateful when they are shown how to calm their roller coaster emotions and release the stressors they hold in their body.

What's Taking Responsibility Got to Do With It?: Everything. The solution of making our schools a police state is not the answer. We do need school security, but the bigger answer lies in everyone taking responsibility for this issue. We are all responsible for our own thoughts, feelings and actions. The more responsibility people take for what they think, say and do, the happier their lives become. We get the type of society we deserve. We get the schools we deserve.

By teaching children skills to deal with their aggressive impulses in the elementary years, we will have a society that has less tolerance for bullying and violent behavior. By teaching them systems theory and higher levels of thinking, we can help the students see the necessary part of their creating their own culture. We can develop ways of understanding the innate quality of human aggression and find safe outlets for it. We can insist on school programs that teach tolerance. As Gandhi said, "Our ability to reach unity in diversity will be the beauty and the test of our civilization."

My social conscience started the moment my aunt told me that I had hurt my cousin by continually running away and excluding her, a message my mother had not given me. My conscience took a big jump in the eighth grade. The boys, as a joke, nominated the poorest girl in class to run for the Spring Fling Queen. We girls laughingly went along with it. The teachers in my small town who disliked the slow learners and children from poor families who were unclean, did nothing. However, a first year, red-headed teacher who had not been raised with the prejudices of our small Midwestern town, took us all to task and lectured us on how cruel we were. Miss Odgen, herself an outcast among the other teachers, cared enough to speak up and tell us that what we were doing was wrong. She correctly helped awaken in me a sense of guilt from my conscience and a sense of duty in helping those considered less fortunate. Social responsibility started when we girls took that poor girl under our wing and helped her buy her a dress and a permanent so that she would look nice at the dance.

What's Caring Got to Do With It? What's Love Got to Do With It?

Everything!

CRUELTY DOESN'T DISCRIMINATE

Here is what one school did to address the issue of violence. Amidst pressures in the media on a daily basis, students often lose track of the important issues in the world. Instead, attention is given primarily to 'fitting in' and being a part of the crowd. When students feel the only way they will be accepted is through violence towards others, it becomes necessary to take charge and fix this problem, before it's too late.

It is important to have tolerance and acceptance in our schools, homes and communities. Without it, these places are not the safe havens which they should be. In light of recent tragic events in Colorado and Alberta, Oakville Trafalgar High School has decided to initiate the "I WILL" Campaign. The s school community has started this campaign to actively support
nonviolence in our schools and bring awareness to individuals about how they are treating one another.

By participating in this campaign, the O.T. community has recognized the destructive effects of ridicule and the right to safety in not only our school environment but our community as well.

By signing your pledge card today, together we can take charge and get a head start on the prevention of violence and hostility. Make your school the safest place it can be, and sign your card.

"I WILL" Pledge

As a part of my community and Oakville Trafalgar High School

I will pledge to be a part of the solution.
I will eliminate taunting from my own behavior.
I will encourage others to do the same.
I will do my part to make my community a safe place by being more sensitive to others.
I will set the example of a caring individual.
I will not let my words or actions hurt others.
... and if others won't become part of the solution, I WILL.

____________________________________________

Signing here reflects your commitment to this pledge. Keep your card in a safe place as a reminder of your pledge to support nonviolence at O.T.

School Violence Explained: Table of Contents

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