Bullying article

[Trab]

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/6...prevention.html

[colinian]

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/6...prevention.html

At my intermediate and high schools there was a very active anti-bullying process that included classroom training and participation in skits that I think helped a lot. There was very little bullying on campus, and it was almost always reported to staff by students who saw it happening. In my high school students would usually intervene breaking up bullying attacks.

There's a sentence near the end of the article that includes an amazing statistic:

Disempowering bullies at an early age may thwart future incidents. Society as a whole has an inherent interest in early bully intervention because 60% of those characterized as bullies in grades 6-9 had at least one criminal conviction by age 24 (Olweus, 1993).

It was interesting that there was no mention of who the victims might be other than "over 90% of children with Aspergers Syndrome are bullied". That is so sad. In some schools it's kids branded (accurately or falsely) as gay/lesbian who are the number one targets. But there was another statistic that surprised me: "86% of children 12-15 reported being bullied at school". That percentage seems high to me, but I went to schools where there was very little bullying.

BTW, I was never bullied except in Catholic elementary school, and that didn't last long because I was bigger and stronger than the bullies. There wasn't much tolerance for bullies at St. Mary's school; there was always the threat of expulsion, and while I went to school there (grades 1 through 5) several kids who were bullies were expelled.

Colin

[Cole Parker]

I thought the article superb. It gives one hope.

C