Although schools across Canada will mark Anti-Bullying Day – also known as Pink Shirt Day – on Wednesday, in a very real sense the fight against bullying of students by students is something that must be fought throughout the school year.
Every effort that is made by students, teachers, staff, parents and other school stakeholders to reduce and maybe even someday eliminate school bullying is effort well spent for the community at large.
With students everywhere facing a myriad of challenges throughout their school days, including the need to learn and adapt to new technologies and the need to meet ever-increasing post-secondary school entrance criteria, having to face bullying and all that goes with it is something that no student should face.
Although bullying can affect all grade levels, it is particularly troublesome with the older grades, when students have less stringent supervision and more opportunities to use modern technology to bully.
Alberta Health says bullying can take four principal forms: physical violence such as hitting and stealing; verbal abuse such as name calling, mocking or making sexist or homophobic comments; social abuse such as excluding individuals from group activities; and electronic abuse, also known as cyber bullying, where rumours and harmful comments are spread through the use of texts, emails and on social networking sites.
Not only is bullying counterproductive to good learning and to the overall school environment, it also wastes teacher, staff and counsellor resources in fighting it.
Like all other school divisions in Alberta, the West Central Alberta Chinook's Edge School Division has made the fight against bullying a top priority.
The division's anti-harassment policy #2-05 sets out comprehensive and thorough guidelines for dealing with bullying.
“The policy is intended to provide a greater awareness about harassment and to deal quickly and effectively with any prohibited behaviour that might occur,” the policy reads. “The board is committed to a healthy, harassment-free work and learning environment.”
The policy defines harassment as “any conduct or communication in any form of attitudes, beliefs or actions whether deliberate or unintentional which might be reasonably known to be unwelcome.”
Those found in violation of the policy can face any number of consequences, including outright school expulsion.
Parents and other stakeholders who believe their child, or someone else's child for that matter, is being bullied should readily make use of Chinook's Edge's anti-harassment policy by notifying school officials without delay.
Until bullying is made a thing of the past in Alberta schools, all community stakeholders are encouraged to take up the anti-bullying fight.
