I am currently President of the Smoky Mountain Counseling Association in
Knoxville, TN. I am looking for a speaker for our monthly meeting in
March,
2001. Do you or could this inquiry go to the list?
Thanks,
Randy Gambrell, NCC
edsouth
123 Center Park Drive
Knoxville, TN 37922
phone: 865.218.1083
fax: 865.218.1013
rgambrell@edsouth.org
www.edsouth.org
> -----Original Message-----
> From: edequity-admin@edc.org [SMTP:edequity-admin@edc.org]
> Sent: Monday, July 03, 2000 12:27 PM
> Subject: [EDEQUITY Discussion]
>
> Hello Everyone:
>
> Welcome to our discussion for the month of July on school safety and
> effective strategies to end gender-based violence. One reason we thought
> July would be a good month for this discussion is that one of the themes
> of
> the National Coalition for Sex Equity in Education (NCSEE)'s annual
> conference (July 16-18 in Denver, CO) is "Creating a Respectful and Safe
> Learning and Working Environment." We hope conference participants will
> write in during or after the conference to share what they have learned.
> [For more information about the conference, visit the NCSEE web site at
> www.ncsee.org. or call the Interwest Equity Assistance Center at
> 303-623-9384.]
>
> Since gender-based violence can take many forms, we thought it might help
> facilitate discussion if we focus on one area each week. To begin, this
> week we will discuss teasing and bullying. This will be followed by:
>
> July 10 - 14: sexual harassment in K-12
> July 17 ? 21: dating violence
> July 24 to 29: harassment and violence in higher education
>
> We will use the week beginning July 31 for discussion of any other issues
> you may want to address on this topic and to wrap-up.
>
> In addition to sharing information about research and examples of each of
> the above topics, we encourage you to post information about effective
> strategies, programs, and resources to reduce violence in schools. We
> propose to structure the discussion around the following types of
> strategies and resources:
>
> * TRAINING, including training for teachers, educators, women's groups,
> community-based organizations, and the media.
>
> * EDUCATION including public information and media campaigns, legal
> projects and programs for schools.
>
> * LEGAL REFORM including efforts to get effective legislation adopted
> and/or strengthen existing legislation.
>
> * RESEARCH, including effective tools and methods, resources, and
powerful
> ways to use findings to promote policy and legal change for safe schools.
>
> * PROGRAMS, including successful programs that have been effective in
> reducing violence in schools.
>
> We encourage you to share examples from your work or life in which action
> using any of the above strategies led to a positive change in your life
or
> the lives of other women and girls.
>
> To begin the teasing and bullying discussion, we wanted to share some
> background information compiled by the WEEA Equity Resource Center is
> included with this message.
>
> We look forward to a frank and enriching exchange of information.
>
> Susan
>
> Susan J. Smith
> Moderator
> <edequity-admin@mail.edc.org>
>
>
> BACKGROUND ON TEASING AND BULLYING
> (Compiled by the WEEA Equity Resource Center)
>
> Bullying?"teasing, taunting, threatening, hitting, and stealing that are
> initiated by one or more students against a victim"?and social exclusion
> most often take place in school. Bullying makes life miserable for
> students and interferes with a student's ability to feel safe and
> therefore
> to learn. Studies have found that teasing and bullying are a way of life
> for too many elementary school students. Unfortunately, many adults do
> not
> take teasing and bullying seriously, but rather "tend to think that
> bullying is a given of childhood, at most a passing stage, one inhabited
> largely by boys who will simply, inevitably, be boys." As educators and
> social service providers begin to better understand the cycle of
> socialization that supports bullying and other forms of gendered
violence,
> more research is needed. Dr. Nan Stein of the Wellesley Center for
> Research on Women, notes that:
>
> Bullying remains an under-studied phenomenon in the United States
> in
> contrast with Britain, Norway and Sweden. When bullying has
> been
> acknowledged studies have focused on the pathology of the
> bully
> instead of the whole school culture; or bullying has been regarded
> as
> an unfortunate stage that some children go through on their way
> to
> adolescence and adulthood. Attention has too rarely been given to
> the
> witnesses, bystanders, and observers of bullying; those children
> who
> are neither targeters nor perpetrators, yet who are also affected
> by
> the phenomena of bullying in school.
>
> Bullying can be directed at both girls and boys, at anyone who is seen as
> different because of race, ethnicity, class, or physical appearance.
> Studies have found that boys most typically engage in direct bullying but
> girls who bully are more likely to do things such as spread rumors or
> enforce social isolation. About 15 percent of students are either
bullied
> or bully others. Direct bullying seems to increase through elementary
> school, to peak in middle school, and to decline during high school.
Boys
> engage in bullying behavior and are victims more frequently than girls.
> Boys more frequently are victims of physical bullying while girls are
> victims of exclusion. Verbal abuse, however, remains constant. Studies
> also reveal that, counter to our assumptions, students who bully do not
> "feel bad about themselves" and so victimize others.
>
> Recent research by Educational Equity Concepts and the Wellesley College
> Center for Research on Women "found that teasing and bullying are a part
> of
> the fabric of daily life for students in kindergarten through grade
> three."
> This research also found that:
>
> · Boys initiate most of the teasing and bullying incidents;
both
> girls and boys are the recipients.
> · Boys are more likely to respond physically, while girls are
> more likely to respond verbally to incidents initiated
> against
> them.
> · Teachers and other adults frequently ignore teasing and
> bullying; their predominant response is to remain uninvolved.
> · Students feel that adults do not pay attention or support
them
> in ways that resolve the teasing and bullying.
> · Students want adults to become more involved.
>
> Bullying, like its better-known "older cousin," sexual harassment,
> "deprives children of their rightful entitlement to go to school in a
> safe,
> just, and caring environment; bullying interferes with children's
learning
> concentration, and desire to go to school" and, as such, will become a
> critical issue for research and development over the next few years.
>
> -----------------------------------
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