Commentary; Posted: 8/27/03

Bullying has no place in our schools

By Don Heinzman

Bullying of a student by other students continues to be a problem in elementary and middle schools.

While schools have general policies to prevent bullying, the Anoka-Hennepin School District Board is cracking down on bullying with a better definition of it and more serious consequences for students who bully others.

The recommendation came from the districtís Safe Schools Committee, in part because a parent had complained that her sonís pleas for help from bullying students were not heeded. That may be part of the reason the boy took his own life.

Bullying in the districtís new policy is defined as repeated intimidation or harassment of a student another student or group of students. The key distinction is that the bullying behavior has to be repeated at least once.

Doug Hodson, an assistant principal and chair of the schools Safe Schools Committee, says bullying typically spikes in the fifth through eighth grades.

Under the new policy the parents of students doing the bullying and the parents of the victim may be brought into the school to deal with the problem. The offending students also are asked to submit to peer mediation.

If the bully continues to pick on another student, he could be expelled. Last year in the district, five middle school students were expelled.

The Anoka-Hennepin school district is taking another step other school districts might follow. It will wage an informational campaign to raise awareness of the seriousness of the problem.

The new policy and other public information about bullying will be in the annual mailing to parents.

ISD 831 in Forest Lake has joined the ranks of school districts formulating policies against bullying. When students return to school here in the fall, a new policy on bullying will be in place.

In Anoka-Hennepin, the campaign will focus on what is bullying, how students can report bullying, who are being bullied or their children who are bullying others, how staffs should report cases of bullying, how parents can help their children who are being bullied or their children who are doing the bullying. Similar steps have been incorporated into the Forest Lake policy.

In addition, Anoka-Hennepin parents will get information on bullying at open houses or the first parent-teacher conferences. A poster/essay contest on bullying also will be conducted.

In his research of Minnesota schools, Hodson did not find a policy that dealt specifically with bullying in school. An FBI study has revealed that 168,000 kids stay home from school, because of bullying.

The Anoka-Hennepin School District deserves praise for dealing with this issue of bullying, made so prominent in the rash of students shooting others at school, because they were bullied.

Other school districts should examine their policies to be sure they deal specifically with bullying students and there is a method to deal with the problem immediately and to get the parents involved.

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