Schools, parents try to keep pace with cyber-bullying tactics

22 Apr

Teen’s suicide raises long-standing concerns about cyber-bullying

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Maryland, USA

“I felt like I almost had no one that would help me through it or be there for me,” recalled Katie, 16, now a junior at Maryvale Preparatory School in Brooklandville. “You just feel alone. I kept telling myself, I’ll be out of middle school in no time and I’ll get a fresh start.”

Such attacks — among the nearly 4,700 cases of bullying, harassment and intimidation reported by Maryland schools in the last academic year — are common encounters for teens online. Cyber-bullying creates a vexing situation for parents and schools to police, because the harassment and intimidation is pervasive, easily kept out of a parent’s view and inescapable to a generation tied to the Internet.

Unlike traditional schoolyard teasing, cyber-bullying can take place 24 hours a day, and often happens off school grounds, making it difficult for school officials to track. And because discipline is left to local school officials, it varies across Maryland, and is considered too subjective to some parents and teachers.

The consequences of cyber-bullying resounded in Maryland after the Easter Sunday suicide of 15-year-old Grace McComas. Her parents said the sophomore at Glenelg High School in Howard County took her life after months of being victimized online.

“This incident underscores the 21^s^t^-century bully, equipped with a cell phone and a Facebook account, is a constant source of torment for our kids. There is no walking away. There is no hiding,” said New Jersey state Sen. Barbara Buono, who was the lead sponsor on anti-bullying legislation there. The state’s law, considered to be the most progressive in the country, requires all schools to have an in-house anti-bullying specialist.

The New Jersey law was passed in January 2011, following the suicide of a Rutgers University freshman who jumped off the George Washington Bridge after his roommate secretly filmed him kissing a man and posted the video online.

“The 21^s^t-century bullies have made our kids prisoners of their own existence,” Buono said.

Maryland is one of 45 states that spell out the consequences for cyber-bullying in anti-bullying laws, said Jennifer Dounay Zinth, a senior policy analyst with the Education Commission of the States. When the Denver-based commission conducted the same survey in 2005, no state had a clearly defined cyber-bullying provision, she said.

Meanwhile, the White House on Friday endorsed a bill by U.S. Sens. Bob Casey, D-Pennsylvania, and Mark Kirk, R-Illinois — co-sponsored by Maryland Sens. Barbara Mikulski and Ben Cardin — that calls on schools to do more to protect students against bullying and harassment.

The Safe Schools Improvement Act, which ties anti-bullying policies to federal funding, would require schools to have a code that prohibits the conduct, to do more to prevent it and to set new reporting standards.

Why kids cyber-bully

Gregory Fritz, a Brown University professor of psychiatry and human behavior, said cyber-bullying is receiving more attention because of the number of suicides directly related it. He said two groups of young people are cyber-bullies: regular kids and deviant ones.

Children and teens, especially those in middle school and ninth grade, seek acceptance in peer groups with rules that can be cruel or arbitrary, said Fritz, who also is academic director at Bradley Hospital in Rhode Island. Young people will try to reduce their own insecurity at the expense of others.

The age group is also prone to being impulsive and thinking in extremes, two traits that perpetuate cyber-bullying, Fritz said. With a click of a mouse, a teen can send a hurtful message without having thought twice, he said.

Anger and other Maryvale students attended a multi-school diversity conference last week on cyber-bullying, depression, drug awareness, gender stereotypes and disabilities.

It is one of several planned for the Baltimore region, including a forum to be scheduled in early May by Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice and Howard County Councilman Calvin Ball.

Sameer Hinduja, co-director of the Cyberbullying Research Center, will be the keynote speaker Thursday at an anti-bullying seminar hosted by Howard County schools and the local PTA.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/howard/bs-md-ho-cyber-reader-20120422,0,1664908.story

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