Local Principals Cheer Possibility of Bullying Bill in State Legislature

by Laura Camper
Times-Georgian
Carrollton, GA
February 1, 2010

New legislation being discussed in the state Legislature would, among other things, redefine bullying to include cyber bullying that interferes with a student’s education and call on the Georgia Department of Education to develop a model policy to deal with the problem.

Many local school administrators are grateful state legislators are giving some attention to the issue of bullying, because it is a serious issue, they say.

“It’s one of those things that we always have to be on the lookout for,” said Principal of Carrollton Junior High School Todd Simpson. “I wouldn’t say it’s a pervasive problem, but it is one of those things that when you do have a case of bullying it’s serious because it can make a child miserable.”

All the local schools have some policy for dealing with bullying that models the current state policy. Most use a combination of consequences and counseling to deal with the issue.

The current state policy has a “three-times-and-you’re-out” clause that mandates the board of education assign a bully to an alternative school after three incidents. However, the best way to deal with a bully is to work with the parents to stop the behavior before the student has to be transferred, said Mark Albertus, principal of Carrollton High School.

“We’ve got to partner and work together because it’s a tough time for a teenager,” Albertus said. “We take it very seriously. We know that some kids are more vulnerable than others, don’t have the support at home or this or that and we really try hard to dig into it very quickly.”

Partnering with parents of both the bully and victim is important in stopping the chain of events that can hurt the students and keep bullies from resorting to the same kind of behavior again.

Ever-advancing technology has also made it difficult for some to keep up with the changing environment of the school. Students are becoming technologically savvy at much younger ages, making cyber bullying a much bigger problem. In fact, Carrollton City Schools added cyber bullying to its bullying policy this year.

“That’s a big deal these days,” Albertus said. “I’m not looking to police for what the kids go do on their own time, but when it interferes with instruction, when they come on campus and it interferes with instruction, that’s when I have to be sensitive to it.”

The administrators agree, expanding the definition to include cyber bullying and extending the regulations to include elementary schools is a good thing. It allows the elementary schools to develop policies before there is a problem.

“We don’t have anything in our policy at the elementary level right now on cyber bullying and that is certainly something that we will look into because you know, children younger and younger they’re carrying cell phones and they’re on the Internet,” said Sherry Goodson, principal of the Carrollton Elementary School.

However, as protectors overseeing the safety of the children in their charge, the administrators have some suggestions about effective ways to deal with the problem. Every child deserves to come to school and feel safe and protected, they said.

Above all, the school administrators who commented want to be proactive. Rather than reacting to a bad situation, they want to be able to nip the problem in the bud before there is a serious problem and that has become increasingly difficult as class sizes increase. Students, especially as they get older, tend to not want to tell anyone about being bullied. That means either another student has to tell the teachers or teachers and employees have to observe the bullying occurring.

Trent North, principal of Carrollton Middle School, believes the state should go back to smaller class sizes to allow teachers to spend more time with each student in the classroom. That allows the teachers to develop a trusting relationship with the students and to be close enough to identify any problems quickly.

DeMarcos Holland, principal of Villa Rica Middle School, agreed.

“The best proactive measure we can take is being able to spend some real time with our kids and a lot of times our teachers alone are not enough,” Holland said. “We need some support staff being able to talk with those kids. Because sometimes it’s like prying things out of them. They won’t tell you most often.”

Holland tries to offer opportunities to build relationships between students and teachers through intensive programs like his summer orientation program. The program lasts a week and ends with a field trip to teach the students to work together. It brings the students and teachers to the school to get to know the school and each other and hopefully heads off bullying.

“When you get kids to interact positively in a social setting, when they become more comfortable you talk about it,” Holland said.

Programs like that are part of the solution, he said, but as budget cuts winnow school staff and faculties throughout the state, one-on-one time with students can be sacrificed.

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