Imagine that you are a child again, and there is this one guy that taunts you mercilessly, but you can’t report him for bullying. Now imagine that the situation escalates and he starts to physically assault you. As much as you want to defend yourself, you know that sticking up for yourself might force the school to expel you. This is the current state of bullying in the United States. With a definition that is exceedingly broad and the zero tolerance policies allowing for no concept of self-defense, youth in America are left with no help with it comes to bullies. That is why I believe that we must make a change for the children that can’t stand up for themselves so that they know they are cared for by the authority figures they trust.
Currently,
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The main purpose for zero tolerance policies was to prevent violence within school grounds, so as to protect every student on school grounds. “However, research indicates that zero-tolerance policy expulsions are primarily for non-violent offenses, because the definition of bullying includes verbal aggression and other forms of non-physical intimidation” (Borgwald 150). These policies are ineffective in how they are implemented because expelling a student for any infraction gives them no chance to learn from their mistakes. In addition, the policies actually lead to an increase in covert bullying, such as cyberbullying, as opposed to direct bullying (Borgwald …show more content…
Complaining after being called a silly name is usually fairly immature, but in the case of more severe insults, there should be an exception. With regards to the zero tolerance policy, there needs to be some provision that allows for self-defense. In addition, instead of taking it out fully on the children committing violence, bullying prevention programs and policies should target the households of both bully victims and perpetrators. This is because a major source of bullying stems from “a lack of warmth and involvement on the part of their parents” or “A lack of supervision or intervention by parents, guardians, teachers and other adults” ("Bullying Prevention and Intervention"). Catherine P. Bradshaw, PhD, MeD, states that, bullying prevention programs that include at least some basic parent programming (eg, information about bullying) are more effective than programs that do not including such activities.” In addition, Bradshaw states that family dinners are important because they allow for children to effectively communicate major portions of their day. This effective communication between children and parts has shown, “reduced rates of youth conduct problems and delinquency, substance use, and some mental health problems (eg, depression)” (Bradshaw 992). Targeting the parents and household of victims and bullies would allow for
Students are told not to bully, not to say mean words, and not to hurt others. It only focuses on the negative side of the problem. “Empathy clearly plays a tremendous role in an effective anti-bullying program” (Jones and Augustine, 2015). Kids aren’t being taught compassion, tolerance, and empathy thought these programs. The only thing that these students are being taught is what a bully is and everything they should not do. Clearly, tolerance is not being built amongst students. This is a trait that students learn as small children. It is hard to change the viewpoint of a child once their viewpoint has been taught, whether it be good or bad, they develope those thoughts about certain topics. Once tolerance and acceptance is established and taught bullying and harassment in secondary schools will significantly drop.
Every seven minutes a child is bullied. On average, 68 percent of students say that “other kids pick on them, make fun of them or bully them” (“Statistics”). This causes students to turn to violence. bullied or made fun of which cause them to become violent. How much longer are schools going to sit back and do nothing about bullies? Without punishing bullies, students’ will continue to harm themselves to massive extents. Schools are not doing enough to stop or prevent bullying, as demonstrated by the creation of the group Stand for the Silent.
The zero tolerance policy has become a national controversy in regards to the solid proven facts that it criminalizes children and seems to catch kids who have no intention of doing harm. Although, there has been substantial evidence to prove that the policies enforced in many schools have gone far beyond the extreme to convict children of their wrongdoing. The punishments for the act of misconduct have reached a devastating high, and have pointed students in the wrong direction. Despite the opinions of administrators and parents, as well as evidence that zero tolerance policies have deterred violence in many public and private schools, the rules of conviction and punishment are unreasonable and should be modified.
Bullying has become a major problem facing the United States today. The American Psychological Association reports that roughly 40% to 80% of children are involved in bullying on some level during their time in school. (APA, 2014) The magnitude of the problem can be observed in the statistics. In the United States, a total of 4,080,879 children between the ages of five and 18 have been the victims of bullying compared to 3,892,199 who have reported that they have engaged in bullying someone else. Additionally, 851,755 said that they have been both the victim and the bully. That's a whopping 8,824,833 people in the United States that have been involved in bullying behavior on one level or another. (High, B., 2000 Census)
Imagine coming home from school, you are already upset from getting bullied and then your phone starts beeping. It repeatedly keeps alerting you and it fills up with hateful messages and threats. This is the life of a child who is bullied and harassed, this happens to them constantly until they eventually implode. Adults think of bullying as kids being kids and being a part of life; but, no child should go through the pain and torture of that. Bullying happens across the world, with no cure to it, it 's a plague that needs to stop. Children from the UK, France, and many other countries are subjected to this. In the United States, many cases have been dealt with which involves pre-teens and teens committed
As you can see, bullying is a huge problem. We need to start advocating for the victims and assess the problem. Today over 3.5 million teens are being bullied. “ Fighting means you could lose. Bullying means you can’t. A bully wants to beat somebody; he does not want to fight them,” Andrew Vachss-American crime fiction
In fact, Columbine was the first major incident to bring to light the issue of bullying. Due to these findings, many schools in the 21st century have adopted anti-bullying programs to help put an end to bullying. However, anti-bullying programs are not effective, or as successful as they should be, which show there is no solution to fully end the growing problem of bullying. Many people find the word “bullying” hard to define. In fact, the definition of the word has changed greatly over the last ten years.
Not only is it already hard to be a teenager, but having to deal with constant teasing and harassment is just something no one needs. There is a point in life where bullying can become so terrifying that students will rather stay at home than have to face their bully. Darnell “Dynasty” Young is a 17 year old gay teen who has gone through every possible way to stop his bullies from harassing him. His mother has tried everything but hasn’t been able to put a stop to it. Until one day, Young’s mother bought Darnell a stun gun. His mother told him to bring it to school and when the bullies began to torment him to take it out. He did just that, he did not actually shoot anyone he just waved it up in the air to intimidate his bullies. He not only got suspended but he also got arrested, yet the six boys teasing him and calling him names received no punishment whatsoever. (CNN) Young is one of the many kids that go through this type of abuse in a place where they should feel safe. This is an example of the school failing to do anything to prevent this kind of behavior, even after the parents try to intervene. This is also a great example of parents failing to implement high behavior standards by enforcing them to retaliate. Parents should be there to advice a peaceful way of resolving this in a non violent way not give them the weapon. By implementing prevention programs such as activities that help fight bullying can ultimately lead to the end of this horrific thing some kids face each day.
Bullying and Violence in Public Schools Although bullying has always been a problem in schools, it has more recently become a bigger crisis with vicious consequences. “However it is defined, bullying is not just a child’s play, but a terrifying experience many schoolchildren face everyday. It can be as direct as teasing, hitting or threatening, or as indirect as exclusions, rumors or manipulation” (Garrett 2). Most kids do not think certain actions are classified as bullying, yet they do not realize the severity of the way they treat their peers.
Bullying, often dismissed as a normal part of growing up, is a real problem in our nation's schools, according to the National School Safety Center. One out of every four schoolchildren endures taunting, teasing, pushing, and shoving daily from schoolyard bullies. More than 43 percent of middle- and high-school students avoid using school bathrooms for fear of being harassed or assaulted. Old-fashioned schoolyard hazing has escalated to instances of extortion, emotional terrorism, and kids toting guns to school. It is estimated that more than 90 percent of all incidents of school violence begin with verbal conflicts, w...
As a society, we often underestimate the damages that bullying cause on children, not just America but all over, and the ones who suffer are the victims themselves. Victims are damaged with the stigma that they are weak, yet somehow have to fend for themselves against something that they have little to no control over. Whether it is for funding, a reputation or any other reason schools sweep their bullying problem under the rug or turn a blind eye, however they have more potential to end this growing issue. To the schools that think bullying is not their problem, they should know that according to heyugly.org, an anti-bullying campaign, “Approximately, 160,000 children a day stay home from school in fear of being bullied.”They also point out
Bullying has been around for decades and yet it is still a reoccurring problem, and it is only getting worse. The National Center for Educational Statistics, in 2009, said nearly 1 in 3 students between the ages of 12 and 18 reported being bullied in school. Eight years earlier, only 14 percent of that population said they had experienced bullying(Ollove,2014). There are two types of bullying the direct form and indirect form, in the direct form the victim receives physical harm example kicking pushing shoving. In the indirect form the victim receives emotional or mental harm by name-calling, rejection, gossip, threats, or insults(Green,2007). It doesn’t matter which way the victim was bullied it still causes
Bullying has always been present within the United States. Although the issue has been around for a long time, it continues to grow and become more of problem. It is said that about 160,000 children within the United States are refusing to go to school because of bullying. Another statistic is that within American schools alone, there are an estimated 2.1 billion bullies and 2.7 billion victims (Dan Olewus, MBNBD). The numbers presented here are outrageous and although there are organizations to stop bullying, obviously there needs to be a new set of solutions. Any type of bullying presents problems to children, “Suicide, depression, anxiety, substance abuse, trouble with the law, poor performance in school and work, and lack of involvement in socially accepted activities are some of the difficulties resulting from bullying (Austin, Reynolds, Barnes, Shirley). Of course, there is more than just a single type of bullying. Feeding ground for bullies can range anywhere from text-message or cyberbullying to physical bullying in schools. Also, bullies can begin to strike at a young age and could also be; teenage, middle-age, or even the elderly. Even though there are these many versions of problematic bullies, the largest bullying problems take place within the school setting: a place that is supposed to be safe for children rather than harmful. Although it seems impossible to completely get rid of bullying, these are a few suggested solutions; making the school informed on bullying issues, schools implementing rules on bullying, and having students positively use electronics to stop bullying.
Bullying against teens is still happening even though there are various awareness programs to try to prevent it. I want to create awareness of bullying against teens of all religions, race, and sexual orientation. Even with the various attention to bullying, the problem still persists despite the school providing awareness, students are still afraid to say anything. Societal patterns today make bullying a difficult issue to eliminate. Starting in 2007, a total of 35 states made laws to go against bullying at school. These laws consisted of a clear definition of bullying, and how schools will be required to enforce uniform standards of conduct. The reason bullying comes as such an issue to me is because I actually know friends that have been suicidal and have caused themselves harm due to being bullied every day, in school and at home.
While this definition is greatly more accepted around the world, it leaves many researchers wanting more clarification. If the same person repeats similar negative actions, one time, to multiple people; is it bullying? If one person receives a negative action, one time, from someone who has done this to other students; are these people being bullied? For the schools that are implementing zero tolerance policies for bullying, when do the teachers and administrators act on such inappropriate behaviors? “The problem with the repeated occurrence requirement is that the waiting period heightens the negative effects on the victim, allows the bully to feel rewarded, increases fear in onlookers, and makes intervention a more lengthy process” (Ballard, R 1999 p. 41). Acknowledging negative behaviors and language in the classrooms and/or the hallways is needed by the staff and the students. When pointing out an action that was demonstrated once can help in preventing the risks of