Anti-Bullying is a Community Movement: What Martial Arts Can Do

As a community, El Dorado County and Sacramento County could do more to support anti bullying. What if every jiu-jitsu and martial arts school focused on an anti bullying program for the first part of the school semester this fall. If the martial arts schools in our area could all get together and agree to teach a curriculum that would teach our students about the different types of bullying, how to prevent it, and how to get help, I believe we would see a dramatic decline in bullying. 

The problem is that we don't always have time to focus on bullying because there are so many other things that need to be accomplished. The need to accomplish "things" could be incorporated into an anti bullying project.

This article states some good statistics and facts about what is going on and what should be done, but in truth brings no solution to the table. Get more teachers involved. Get the parents involved. Get the students involved.....

Isin't that what everyone has been doing for the last decade? Our kids jiujitsu program at el dorado hills brazilian jiujitsu will focus on bullying fro the months of August through the middle of September. Not only will be giving students the tools to help them use their words to communicate and empower themselves, but also learning how to physically defend themselves if necessary. We will teach them how to fall without getting injured and how to get back up to their feet without getting hurt. We will teach them about using their voice to say stop. We will teach them how to get out of a headlock. We will teach them about reporting and not telling. 

This is just the beginning. Help us serve our community and support the anti-bullying in our neighborhood of El Dorado Hills, Folsom, and Cameron Park. See you on the mat! 

El Dorado Hills Jiu-Jitsu 

916.595.4064

Bullying: common ground and next steps

Print

By Wesley Vaughn 
Email the author | Follow on Twitter
on July 07, 2014 at 9:33 AM, updated July 07, 2014 at 10:13 AM

0

Reddit

Email

This article is part of our series on bullying. Here are the other articles in the series:

• Voices from forums

• My personal experience and lessons learned

• Share your stories and thoughts

What's Been Said

A report on bullying from the David Mathews Center for Civic Life identifies four common areas of concern. The report, published last month, follows a yearlong series of public forums that canvassed the state. The Center received 1,700 survey responses from its 4,500 forum participants.

1. Zero tolerance policies while tough may be ineffective

Although 65 percent of respondents strongly agree on harsh punishments for bullies, others noted that a zero tolerance policy is reactive rather than preventative. A balance between the two must be developed instead.

2. Students need protection when reporting bullying

Forum participants generally agreed that students should be empowered to report instances of bullying. Forty-three percent of survey responders said that students who report bullying should do so even if they may be bullied further. School officials in attendance believed that providing anonymity would even be worth the risk of possible false reports.

3. "It takes a village"

One recurrent theme from the report is that communities should support anti-bullying efforts in their schools. Students, teachers and administrators alone cannot bear the responsibility. Almost 70 percent of respondents said that the community and parents should spend more time working towards anti-bullying efforts. Fifty-four percent said they strongly agreed that civic groups and businesses have a role in the prevention of bullying.

4. Cyberbullying is a real issue

Forum participants agreed that cyberbullying affects students. The meteoric rise of social media has opened up more venues for bullying, and now bullying can follow students home. Almost 52 percent of responders strongly agreed that parents should monitor their children's cell phone and internet use.

What's Been Done

5. Alabama's law

The Student Harassment Prevention Act of 2009 requires schools to report and post bullying statistics online, create an anonymous tipline, and adopt a compliant anti-harassment policy by 2010.

6. Schools with compliant policy

By 2012, two-thirds of the state's school districts had adopted such a policy and half had created the mandated reporting forms, according to a review by the Alabama School Connection.

Challenges and Next Steps

7. Data can't always be trusted

Unfortunately, the reported bullying statistics are not entirely reliable. In the 2011-2012 school year, less than one percent of students state-wide were reported to be bullied. The national average is 15 to 25 percent.

8. Evolution of bullying

As concern for issues such as sexuality and gender has increased, harassment has become a substitute term for bullying. Bullying falls under the state's definition of harassment, but Alabama is unique in not using the term bullying in its law.

9. What's next

It's time that responsibility be put on the actors involved: schools, students, parents and the community. Each school must first measure its baseline of bullying incidents and school culture. Then all involved must do their part, share their successes and failures, and continue working to create safer school environments.

Source: http://www.al.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/07/bullying_common_ground_and_nex.html