A professor I had a few years ago told our class a story about how her son was a victim of a new kind of bullying. Nowadays, it might not be likely for a bully to steal your milk money, but bullying is still a problem. It is just a different kind of problem.
Investigators say two students at Maryville Middle School used another girl’s identity to create a MySpace web page that included a picture of the 13-year-old in her underwear.
The article called it “cyberbullying”.
The Maryville Middle School student tells police that two of her classmate accused her of altering their MySpace pages.
The student says they later retaliated by using her name to create a separate page which included embarrassing pictures of her.
Director of Maryville Schools Dr. Mike Dalton says all forms of bullying are major concerns but harassment over the Internet is the hardest to control.
“They can say things that offend people to the point that they respond in ways that are inappropriate and sometimes very violent,” Dalton says.
When I read the title of this article, I had it figured out before the page came up on my monitor. Why was I not surprised that the middle schoolers victimized their peer through Myspace?
Three reasons:
1. Kids are mean. This was true when I was a kid, probably even when my grandparents were kids. Hate to say it, but it is still true.
2. The internet is a powerful tool, and even though it may seem protected by passwords ect.,this may come as a surprise to you, but it is not 100 percent safe.
3. Most parents are not as involved in their children’s lives (and internet usage) as they ought to be.The article urges parents to educate and closely monitor their kids.
If you know your child is being bullied online, you should save the evidence by printing any emails or web postings.
Also, contact the school counselor or resource officer and make them aware of the situation.
And if the bullying appears to be a crime such as threats of violence, harassment or stalking, you should consider calling police.
What can we do as educators? Well, we could act like adults, and instead of pretending the problem doesn’t exist, we could read books like Special and have class discussions about what bullying looks like in the year 2007.
For some information on more traditional bullying, Sara of http://parentingwithsara.com just wrote a column about it, plus some more information on the psychology of bullying.
tk
I think bullying is a problem that is often overlooked in some schools today. I know of many schools that have zero tolerance policy, but the problem with this is that you have to do something over the top to even get sent to the office for bullying. I think it is sad, but I have heard comments from educators such as “kids will be kids” or “that’s what they do at this age”. Now I know that there is a time for teacher discretion and that you cannot send students to the office for every little glare or snide comment. Teachers must learn to deal with some of the issues on their own.
I think that bullying is as ever present as it has always been. As long as there is a socail heirarchy than there will be someone at the top and someone at the bottom. I know that schools have not found a way to eliminate this type of structure. Bullying needs to be dealt with swiftly and appropriatly. I do think that it cannot be tolerated. No one student has the right to make another student feel uncomfortable in any way, whether it be on the internet or face to face in a classroom.
You make a great point about the Internet being another place where bullying may now occur. I also like what you said about parents. Parents must step up to the plate and be involved in their children’s lives. This does involve knowing what they are doing on the internet. Parents are the authority figure. They do not have to be submissive to a child’s demand for privacy. It is the job of the parent to protec their child from unnessecary harm and being aware will make this job much easier.
This is a good post highlighting an issue that has not been discussed as of late. Thanks for the information and tips.
Jana,
I enjoyed this post… And you are completely right, bully has been and always will be a problem in schools. Yes these new technological advances make it possible to exist under the radar, but you are right. It is the parents responsibility as much if not more that our responsibility as educators.
Just a random question… what was the 13-year-old girl doing with pictures of her in her underwear? Is this a common thing now-a-days? yikes… Looks like evidence points to the parents of this girl needing to step in and be real parents and be aware of what she is doing (including using her camera!).
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