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Power and control drive school bullies But silent majority can stop torment, experts say May 23, 2005
BY PEGGY WALSH-SARNECKI and TERESA MASK
FREE PRESS EDUCATION WRITERS
Frank Williams is a self-confessed former bully who remembers feeling a rush of power when he humiliated other kids.
"It could be anything. I'd see someone walking down the hall and say,
'Uh, that looks so stupid,' " said the 18-year-old senior at Walled
Lake Western High.
John Piechocki, also 18 and a senior at Walled Lake Western, said he
got a personal high from making others feel bad, calling other kids
everything from fat to ugly. It's that high that's the driving force
behind bullying, said Glenn Stutzky, a clinical instructor in Michigan
State University's School of Social Work and an expert in school
violence: "It's having power over another person's life. The ability to
make someone afraid. To make someone cry. To make someone feel
humiliated."
Some experts say it's the taunting, the teasing and the name-calling
that have driven some local kids to create hit lists at school.
One of those kids has been in police custody since September. Andrew
Osantowski, 17, who is expected to stand trial June 7 in Macomb County,
is accused of creating a hit list and plotting to blow up Chippewa
Valley High School in Clinton Township. Schoolmates told the Free Press
at the time of his arrest that he was the victim of near-constant
bullying.
He's not alone. From Red Lake, Minn., to Columbine High in Colorado,
bullying is partly blamed for deep-seated problems that end in tragedy.
Between 15% and 25% of U.S. students have indicated in studies that
they have been bullied with some frequency, according to the Health
Resources and Services Administration.
Yet verbal bullying continues almost unchecked. There's a silent
majority in our schools, watching bullies at work and never speaking
up. Ironically, experts say, this silent majority could be the most
effective tool in stopping bullying.
Myths about bullying
Bullies are likely to be the well-liked kids in school, said Jill
McDonald, a former teacher and administrator from West Bloomfield who
offers anti-bullying workshops and training for school districts around
the country.
McDonald, who is coauthoring a book to help high school teachers
prevent bullying and harassment, said that because bullies often are
the popular kids, their actions are difficult to curb.
"That whole caste system, that social hierarchy -- not only with
students, but with teachers -- determines who is treated better,"
McDonald said.
Stutzky added that "sometimes, people have kind of stereotyped it as a
large boy who has been held back a couple of grades" and is not doing
well academically.
But "the research we've done has shown bullies are more average or
above-average, also in terms of self-esteem. It's a little bit of a
myth that a bully is a loner with few friends," Stutzky said.
Another problem is that educators tend to see verbal abuse as a
conflict between students, and they often deal with it by using
techniques such as peer remediation, where kids are brought together to
discuss their differences.
However, "peer mediation should never be used in bullying situations,"
Bonnie Hanes, acting executive director of the Oakland Mediation
Center, said May 13. "Bullies cannot operate in those settings. They
don't have compassion or empathy."
Bullying is not about conflict, experts say. It's about power and control.
Victims on both sides
Justin was in seventh grade when he switched from a parochial school to
Taylor Public Schools. That's when the bullying started. He was teased
about how he looked, acted, even the music he liked.
"I didn't have the skills to just go up to people and talk to them. I
didn't have the clothes; the style of music I liked was totally
different. A lot of people just thought I was weird," said Justin,
who's now 19 and in college.
"It makes you feel terrible. ...You have nowhere to go. You don't want
to go to school because you don't want to go through it every day. You
have no one to talk to about it because you really start feeling that
there's no one that can feel like you.
"You're alone."
Justin, who asked that his last name not be used because his younger
brother is a student at his old school, felt alone, but he wasn't.
There are almost always witnesses to bullying -- other students or even
teachers who watch and do nothing unless there's physical abuse
involved.
"The truth is, teachers really don't understand it," Justin said. "You
go in and tell the teachers, and what are they going to do, talk about
it? Kids can tell when something's going on, when someone snitches.
It'll just make it worse."
So what can happen to get the bullies to change their ways?
Piechocki said last Monday that he hit a turning point when he realized
he was being hypocritical. Having moved to Walled Lake from Canada, he
often was treated as an outsider and soon decided to stop teasing
others.
"Being on the receiving end really made me realize, 'I'm doing this to other people?' " he said.
For Williams, it was the skills he learned attending a leadership camp
sponsored by the school that made him realize teasing was wrong.
Williams and Piechocki both now work with their school's Positive Peer
Influence group to help prevent bullying.
There are other ways to stop bullying, too. Experts say one may involve
the kids standing next to the victim -- those who are among the 80% to
85% who watch the bullying and do nothing.
According to a November 2003 Skillman Foundation survey, 88% of kids in
Macomb County said they've seen their peers being bullied. In Oakland
County, that number was 79%; in Detroit, it was 80%. Statistics weren't
available for other areas of Wayne County.
These silent students and teachers could be the most powerful weapon available against bullies, if only they'd speak up.
Williams and Piechocki know that to be true. They say they've witnessed
bullying stop when they or others stood up for a student.
In addition, most bullying happens out of teachers' sight, in hallways, cafeterias or on school buses, McDonald said.
"It's not just done in the classroom. The majority of times, it happens
in unsupervised, unstructured areas and at unstructured times. One
adult for every so many students in hallways -- teachers are just
outnumbered," McDonald said. "You can have great teachers, working on
it in class, but then they leave the classroom ... what happens in the
hallway, the cafeteria?"
In defense of teachers, all this anti-bullying work is new, said Hanes,
of the Oakland Mediation Center. Most programs in Oakland County, for
instance, weren't started until 2000, after the Columbine massacre in
1999. Part of the problem, Hanes said, is that teachers don't recognize
the signs of a student being bullied. It happens in front of them, and
they don't even know it.
"It's a look. Or a whisper under the breath," she said.
Another issue, she said, is that while many districts are following a
highly regarded anti-bullying program, they are not following all the
steps to make it really successful.
She said many have the initial meeting and orientation but fail to
continue regular training of staff to make sure the intervention
programs are working, and don't survey students to identify potential
bullies and victims.
The biggest problem, she said, is that some schools don't have social
workers or school psychologists on staff who intervene with the bullies.
The key is to teach the silent majority what to do or say to help victims. Stutzky suggests three ways:
•One is direct intervention, which is telling the bully to stop.
•A second is taking the victim out of the situation, such as inviting the victim to come walk or sit with you.
•The third is showing empathy through something as simple as a pat on the back or a smile.
The silent majority are also victims, Stutzky said. "I've actually had
people come to me, even adults, thinking back on their school
experience, and say, 'I felt awful when I saw this person being
harassed or bullied or intimidated, but I didn't know what to do,' "
Stutzky said.
Shutting down bullies
Ed Joynt remembers mouthing "office please" to a teacher to get away
from classmates who were teasing him. The simple nod allowed him to
escape the taunts about his long hair and short pants -- if only for a
little while. At the time, Ed, now a 14-year-old eighth-grader from
White Lake Township, was teased almost daily about the way he looked a
year ago.
It didn't matter that his hair was more than 15 inches long because he
was going to donate it to Locks of Love, an agency that specializes in
wigs for cancer patients.
Ed said teachers at Highland Middle School often stepped in to help when they saw him in trouble.
This year, the school started ticketing kids who bully others. The
penalties range from warnings to conferences with parents to
suspensions.
Principal Mark Wilson said the school is a nicer place now and that
fights have decreased since the ticketing began. Most of the students
said the tickets work, as well as the Scot Card, which students get for
doing random acts of kindness.
Wilson said it's his way of not just giving the troublemakers all the attention.
Experts and kids agree that left unresolved, bullying can lead to tragedies such as school shootings or suicides.
"I think that's the reason why for all the Columbines and all the
shootings," Justin said. "I can relate to the kids that have done the
shooting, because everyone has their limit. They can't take it anymore."
Victims can reach the point where shooting up their school, the scene
of their suffering, may seem like the only form of control they have.
Or, victims can resort to what Stutzky called "bullycide." They kill themselves.
"That's why we've got to get involved much earlier, and the silent
majority is the key. If we can engage them, give them the skills, they
can tip the balance of power in many schools," Stutzky said.
"Bullying is a form of abuse. I don't know how much progress we're going to make until we come to that understanding."
Contact PEGGY WALSH-SARNECKI at 586-469-4681 or pwalsh@freepress.com, or TERESA MASK at 248-351-3691 or mask@freepress.com.
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