Bullying prevention initiative bearing fruit at two secondary schools

A decline in incidents of bullying has been reported at two of three secondary schools enrolled in the Olweus Bullying Prevention Programme.

Chief Executive Officer of Supreme Counselling Shawn Clarke who spearheads the initiative told Barbados TODAY that cases of bullying at the St George Secondary School are down by 11.3 per cent and 7.9 per cent at the Grantley Adams Memorial School, but the initiative is yet to have a real impact at the Frederick Smith Secondary School.

“Unfortunately, although we relaunched the programme at Frederick Smith Secondary, we have seen little to no movement to date,” he said, while underscoring the programme – which is aimed at creating a safe and positive school environment – was not over and Supreme Counselling would be redoubling its efforts at the Trents, St James school in the new year.

“We have a bullying prevention coordinating committee there at the school that we intend to meet with along with the principal and deputy principal of the school, to make sure that next term is a much better term for the programme at the school, in terms of having activities and having things happening, getting things to really work out there at the school because it is needed, so we will continue the interventions at the school.”

Clarke noted that Frederick Smith Secondary students have, however, been benefiting from the Supreme Counselling Development Awareness Programme in which skills including conflict resolution, self-esteem building and making wise choices are taught.

Concerning the success recorded at both St George Secondary and Grantley Adams Memorial, Clarke noted, “Some children who were actual bullies have somewhat hung their belts up, so to speak, and they are really working with us to help to keep bullying at bay.”

He attributed the improvements to monthly activities conducted at both schools, citing active class meetings where the students engage their form teachers on issues related to bullying.

“We would have presented them with literature, with activities and so on that the teachers will be able to speak to the children on bullying. So each month at the class meeting, there’s a different topic that we present to the teachers to deliver to the students. In addition to that, the students at both schools are allowed to wear to school their bullying prevention t-shirts on the day of their class meetings and that has been working really, really well,” Clarke explained.

But even with the improvements, he called for more support.

“We still don’t have 100 per cent buy-in and we need to get buy-in from the adults on the plant – both the teaching staff and the non-teaching staff,” he said.

Furthermore, he’s appealing to the Ministry of Education to also get behind the initiative.

“I am not convinced at all that we have the buy-in from the Ministry of Education as it relates to the programme as yet. We definitely need to get buy-in from the Ministry of Education. There are other schools that have been asking for the programme. There are other schools that have been calling and they’ve asked, ‘can we please have the bullying prevention programme at the schools?’ But it is costly and we need the Ministry of Education, we need the government to invest in the bullying prevention programme because we have evidence that the programme is working,” Clarke said. (SD)