Bullying: A Rising Concern in Educational Establishments | A YAC Student Blog
Rohit Shukla is a 10th grader at New Albany High School and an active member of YAC.
Why I Chose To Research This Topic:
Rohit Shukla
While growing up, I started to take in the school environment around me. I always saw school as a district where all kids laughed, played, and learned together. However, I soon started to notice the scenes that were occurring behind the curtains. As I entered high school, I noticed and heard about many fights that broke out in the hallways between class periods. These fights pertained to sensitive topics such as: race, gender, etc. After hearing about more incidents that occurred due to bullying in other schools, I sought to learn more about the effects of bullying in our society, the forms it can take, and how we as a community can stop it.
Introduction
Bullying is a detrimental health effect that has affected Central Ohio and our broader community for many years. The National Center for Educational Statistics has reported that one in every five (about 20.2 percent) students in high schools are bullied. There were many reasons for bullying in these areas: physical appearance, race/ethnicity, religion, disability, gender, and sexual orientation. Furthermore, 13 percent of the students in the United States were called names or insulted, 5 percent were physically harassed, and 5 percent were excluded from activities and events intentionally. Additionally, a pattern has emerged where types of bullying are dependent on the gender of the student. The National Center for Educational Statistics reports that a higher percentage of males are physically bullied whereas a higher percentage of females are subjected to rumors and exclusion from events. In order to understand what bullying is, we must look into the different types of bullying and their effects, specifically, on the Central Ohio community. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) label bullying as any unwanted and aggressive behavior by someone who is not related to the person being bullied in any way. It is also said to be an event that is consistently repeated, increasing the likelihood that the bullying will occur in the near future. Bullying comes in two major types:
Physical bullying
Cyberbullying
Physical bullying
According to the Ohio School Board Association, about 28 percent of high school students throughout Central Ohio said they were bullied at school by being part of a physical fight and were given the threat of being attacked by weapons. Physical bully can leave many impacts on an individual such as significant weight loss, digestive upset, muscle pain, weakened immune systems, and heart disease (Physical Effects of Bullying). Furthermore, targeted bullying at school can make one feel alienated and overwhelmed. Often, physical bullying is hard to notice because it is mainly done when adults are not around. Additionally, if an adult or peer were to notice a change in a student’s behavior, it is said that the student will not explain the true reason of their state of being. This is out of the growing fear inside of them that the bully might find out, in which case, there could be detrimental consequences. In order to reduce bullying in Central Ohio, we must take action to create a healthy community. We can do this through three main ways:
Have students fill out surveys on to detect patterns of bullying in a school
Supporting the student being bullied by empowering them to open up to a trusted adult or good friends.
Communication: This ties back to point number 2 where if a student opens up, there are chances that another student is confronting the same things. By communicating, awareness of the bullying can be established among peers and other adults.
Cyberbullying:
Although bullying is very prevalent in schools, it is an even bigger concern online. As access to social media and mobile devices continue to rise among teens, so do the rates of cyberbullying. What exactly is cyberbullying? Cyberbullying is the prolonged harassment of someone through electronic means. Specifically, cyberbullying has been on the rise through the means of social media. This can be done by sending negative or hurtful content about an individual, posting false information, sending threatening messages, etc. The Ohio School Boards Association believes that bullying has substantially risen over time as more teenagers get access to cell phones, laptops, tablets, and other devices. Jim Bisenius, founder of Bully-Proofing Youth, said that cyberbullying completely takes away the security of an individual. “It used to be once a student made it home, they were in the clear,” he said. “But cyberbullying doesn’t give kids respite — it’s 24/7 and those issues can spill back over into school.”(Challenging bullying: Ohio educators and experts discuss improving school climate). This intensifies the effect that cyberbullying can have because now the teen being harassed does not have security even within his/her home. In order to reduce cyberbullying in Central Ohio, we can take appropriate actions by:
Educating teens to keep personal information private. By doing this, a teen can reduce the risk of being targeted by a potential online predator or another teen from school. This solution can help reduce the risk of potential threats such as: “I know where you live”, etc.
Teach teens to think about what they are posting before they post for the public to see. A major part of cyberbullying is using images of a teen to blackmail/use the picture(s) against them.
Always reach out to trusted adults at home, your school district, or even the authorities. By reaching out, you may find that others have faced the same situation or have helped others that were in the same boat.
Do not respond to cyberbullying in most scenarios. If the teen does not engage in further conversation, then the bullying may stop. However, this point is linked to point number three: in order to diminish online offenses, these two steps should be done together.
Where We Are And Where We Need To Go:
As we analyze the various effects that bullying of both forms can have on teenagers, it is up to the community of Central Ohio to take action. Many school districts such as Orange City, Groveport Madison Local, Cincinnati City, and Buckeye Valley Local have already implemented various strategies o tackle this growing health concern in Ohio. However, outside of school, it is crucial that we continue to work as a unified community to help teens through implementing new strategies such as bullying awareness conferences, more safe spaces for targeted teens to discuss their experiences, and most importantly, giving our support for those in need.