Carol Cleveland has seen her share of problems at schools.
In her five years as Kent-Meridian High School’s assistant principal and two more now as the principal of iGrad, Cleveland has had to manage all kinds of behavioral issues, from cultural misunderstandings to outright fights.
She remembers how students would tacitly ask her to be present when they got into a fight, so if things got out of hand she could break it up.
When it comes to the issue of bullying in the district, Cleveland has a few ideas of where it comes from and how to improve it.
The issue symbolizes different problems in Kent, ranging from social and economic issues to the way the district structures education and how different cultures interact.
Often, Cleveland said, bullying or aggressive behavior stems from situations that a child encounters at a young age, such as elementary school, and often carries that chip on their shoulder through much of their development.
“There’s a whole host of reasons why kids are portraying outward the bullying behavior,” Cleveland said.
The issues typically start at a young age, she said, and they can stem from a number of different issues that usually relate to a student’s social, academic or home life.
“It does stem from home life and what they see and what they’re involved in,” Cleveland said. “It also stems from their academic success or lack thereof. It stems from the communication and quality of communication and feedback they receive in the school system. It stems from a variety of influences.”
If a student finds themselves suffering academically, it can put pressure on them to not try and make them feel even more vulnerable. This in turn can lead to self-esteem issues that they’ll project outwards, Cleveland said.
She references how gifted students are often treated differently than others, and given more engaging curriculum, which can lead other students to assume that they’re bad at what they do, even if they do have latent talents that the school district’s curriculum doesn’t necessarily bring out.
The middle school and early high school social worlds are also times of upheaval for students, Cleveland said. They’ll find themselves going from being at the top of the social ladder in elementary school to the bottom in seventh grade and then back to the top again in eighth grade and finally on the bottom in ninth. It can be easy for a student to inadvertently say the wrong thing to the wrong person at the wrong time to accidentally start an argument.
What may be OK in one family of one culture may not be a respectful thing to say in another culture, Cleveland said, and the misunderstandings and inadvertent disrespecting can create social friction.
“You’re going to have a little bit of chaos,” she said.
It’s easy for a fight to start, or an enmity to brew, with a retaliatory nature and from a culture that, Cleveland said, is built around not backing down.
“There’s a type of save face deal going on,” Cleveland said, regarding the areas around Kent-Meridian. “It is part of the culture in this surrounding area,” she said. The resulting psychological belief in standing your ground is a chief cause of many of the fights that take place between students in the district.
“That’s what’s going on, until somebody tells you differently or until you grow enough and mature,” Cleveland said. “As I matured I understood that that wasn’t the way to behave.”
One solution, Cleveland suggested, is providing mediation services to help community members. “Maybe there should be a community panel in this area that represents all the different neighborhoods.
“The community has to come together on this one. To solve any problem in this area, the school has to get help,” Cleveland said.
The district has been working to develop better anti-bullying programs, said Brad Brown, director of Student and Family Support Services. He’s purchased the Second Step Anti-Bullying program, which runs from pre-kindergarten to eighth grade. The programs are poised to reduce impulsive and high risk behavior, and were recommended through the district’s Anti-Bullying Task Force.
Instead of intensive anti-bullying, the programs try to teach respect and character development.
“We’re trying to make it a value in the district,” said district spokesman Chris Loftis.
Cleveland herself organized a weekend anti-bullying event at Kent-Meridian, which she says had positive results but dwindled over time as students fell back into old habits. The problem was that the school’s lessons only went so far, and weren’t always reinforced when students went home.
The community is still the first place to go for anti-bullying programs, Cleveland said. No matter how much the Kent School District spends on new programs, speakers and weekend events, the lessons have to be present outside of the school to truly sink in.
“I spent $50,000 on anti-bullying programs at Kent-Meridian,” Cleveland said, “but it only goes so far.”
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