Almost one out of every five students (20%) has reported being bullied, and 50% of teens said they experienced bullying at school. These statistics highlight a concerning reality of the widespread problem of bullying in schools. Bullying can seriously affect the emotional, physical, and academic health of the victims. Bullying creates a negative environment in schools, making them places where kids are anxious and scared to go. This is not a problem that parents should address, parents often underestimate bullying, but the truth is bullying is more common than they realize. Bullying occurs most commonly in schools and therefore it is the responsibility of the school to take action against it.

The first step teachers and administrators should take in addressing bullying is to assess the level of bullying at their school. Adults are often not very accurate at predicting the amount of bullying at school, so it is important to ask students about their experiences. Getting an accurate picture of bullying can motivate teachers and students to take action against bullying. For example, if your teachers perceive bullying as a rare event at school, encouraging them to implement a bullying prevention program may be difficult. If teachers see that bullying affects many students at your school, they may be more inclined to focus on bullying prevention. Understanding bullying at your school can help you to plan strategies to address the problem. For example, it is important to know where bullying occurs at your school so that you can increase adult supervision in those areas. Assessing bullying at different points in time can help you to evaluate your school’s progress in dealing with bullying. Anonymous surveys are a great way to collect information on bullying.  Students will most likely feel more comfortable reporting their bullying experiences if they don’t have to include their names on the questionnaire. 

One great way to prevent bullying is recognizing gateway behaviors. Researchers have found that small behaviors can often signal the beginning patterns of bullying. Some gateway behaviors to watch out for are eye-rolling, prolonged staring, name-calling, ignoring, causing physical harm, spying, or even stalking. If you can recognize these behaviors early on, there is a chance you can prevent bullying in the future. 

Effective programs require strong administrative leadership and ongoing commitment on the part of the adults in the school system. Those programs that show the most promise are comprehensive in approach. They involve the entire school community and include school-wide interventions, classroom activities, and individual interventions. Bullying prevention efforts should begin early – as children transition into kindergarten – and continue throughout a child’s education. Effective bullying prevention programs should have no end date and should become part of the life of your school. Ongoing staff development is important to sustain bullying prevention programs. From the earliest ages, students should participate in activities that boost social-emotional learning. As a teacher, find ways to help children understand and appreciate their identity as well as others. To do this requires empathy and kindness. When students can approach ideas and problems from multiple perspectives, they are less likely to bully others.

Overall, teachers and schools need to make changes to address the very relevant problem of bullying. You, as a student, can also make a difference in the struggle against bullying. Wake County has implemented a course, Stand Up! Speak Out! to educate us about bullying. It teaches us that if we see something then we should say something. There is an anonymous tip line where you can contact a professional if you are worried that someone is being bullied. The tip line is 919-856-1911.