May 04, 2008 01:44 am
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By Violet Spader
Staff Writer
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and when it comes to bullying in schools, that’s the attitude Enid officials take.
“We want our schools to be safe schools,” said Ruth Ann Erdner, Enid Public Schools assistant superintendent.
That’s not always an easy task.
According to a 2007 Oklahoma Youth Risk Behavior Survey, responses of 2,612 randomly polled public school students, grades 9-12, indicated 22.3 percent of students carried a weapon such as a knife, gun or club within the past 30 days of when the study was conducted. About 9 percent carried the weapon to school within a 30-day period.
The study also showed 5.1 percent of students did not go to school at some point within a 30-day period because they felt unsafe at school or traveling to or from school. More than 10 percent of students were in a physical fight on school property within a one-year period, and 7.7 percent reported being physically forced to have sex when they did not want to.
While EPS doesn’t deny bullying and fights occur in schools, Erdner said the number of suspensions due to fights have decreased in recent years.
“With the preventative programs in place, the numbers have decreased from elementary school to high school,” she said. “Prevention works, as we use it.”
For the past five years, Enid schools have had formal site plans for dealing with the prevention of bullying. Erdner said parents can get information from their student’s school concerning the specific plans of the site.
“Site planning is so important,” said Amber Graham Fitzgerald, EPS school and community relations director. “It’s not one-size-fits-all. Each school can determine what’s best for them.”
It all starts with good relations
At Emerson Junior High School, principal Kim Jones said her staff focuses on building relationships with their students.
“It’s important to have good relationships with your students, because if something serious is going on they will come and tell you,” Jones said. “At that point, we can intervene.”
Emerson students discuss bullying in their character education during homeroom classes, and Irish Ambassadors, student leaders, visit homerooms to facilitate peer discussion on the topic.
At the junior high level, Jones said students know what bullying is but sometimes have to be reminded to look at it from another perspective.
“I ask them, ‘How would this look if I was standing on the outside?’” she said. “They can see that it does look like bullying.”
Enid schools have Great Expectations
A district-wide program, Great Expectations, has been important in preventing bullying, Erdner said.
“Great Expectations is based on mutual respect,” Jones said. “It just changes the tone of a building. The tenets just don’t leave room for bullying.”
Most students, Jones said, consider bullying an interruption to their school day and will report instances.
And, sometimes preventing fights just comes down to “good, old-fashioned planning,” Fitzgerald said. This ranges from having adults in school hallways during passing periods, in addition to having procedures outlined for when incidents occur.
If a bullying incident escalates into a physical altercation, Erdner said campus police will be called. Parents of the students involved will be called also, she said, and a report will be filed. Consequences include in-school or out-of-school suspension, according to Erdner, though each situation is dealt with on an individual basis.
“There have always been fights in school,” Erdner said. “But we’re more cognizant of it now.”
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