Schools battle the bullies

Bullying has always been a problem in schools, but it has risen to a new level, Chesterfield County Superintendent Marcus J. Newsome said in a recent presentation.

"They have the Internet now," he said.

Bullies also have other communications devices, such as phones for texting and sharing pictures.

"Cyber-bullying presents unique challenges to schools because once something is put out on the Internet, it has the power to become available to the entire school and more," said Martha Turner, a counselor at Robious Middle School. "Before the Internet, bullying took the form of gossip, verbal or physical harassment."

In observation of Bullying Prevention Month in January, Chesterfield schools held a number of activities in the form of training, Internet safety classes and anti-bullying pledges, among other things.

Last year, 366 incidents of bullying were reported in Chesterfield schools, which had close to 59,000 students. That number includes cyber-bullying.

Several schools in the county have adopted an internationally recognized anti-bullying program called Olweus, which provides staff training and highlights school rules against bullying and its consequences.

Chesterfield school counselors have developed an anti-bullying program that was implemented last month in every elementary school that did not already have one.

The program provides training for the entire staff and parents, plus classroom lessons for all students on dealing and preventing bullying. Internet safety classes, which have a bullying component, were implemented in every school in the fall, as was required by the General Assembly.

Cyber-bullying presents a new set of challenges to schools, said Tammy McGraw, director of the Office of Educational Technology at the state Department of Education, which has developed Internet safety program guidelines for school divisions.

"It gets very difficult in terms of when and how to deal with cyber-bullying in schools," she said. "Where do schools start and stop if you're using an electronic device to bully a student?"

Sometimes, students don't think about the long-lasting and far-reaching consequences of using technology to bully. "Sometimes when kids do instant-messaging, students may not always be aware of the impact they're having on the victims," McGraw said.

Robious Middle's Turner said there used to be a clear definition of what happened during school and what took place after school or at home.

"Occasionally, we have school involvement because of a parent phone call or a printout of an e-mail that a student will bring to school," she said. "If it happened at home, we try to inform parents. If an e-mail refers to an incident at school, the school will need to deal with it."

Denise L. Purvis, director of the dance program for the Thomas Dale High School Specialty Center for the Visual and Performing Arts, said she and her students have been fighting bullying. A couple of years ago, some students were spreading mean comments about one of her student on MySpace.

" I encouraged her to go to the school administration about it, and they called the bullies in to deal with the situation," she said. "The next year, the girls had become good friends."

Contact Juan Antonio Lizama at (804) 649-6513 or .