School Bullying Council

After a group of cheerleaders dropped a teammate during a stunt toss at a Saturday night football game, the five girls were ordered to drop to the ground to do 25 pushups. But the student manager wasn’t pleased with the effort and her friend allegedly stepped on the back of one cheerleader, then 12, and told her to work harder.

The cheerleader’s mom, Christine Bench, complained to administrators at Most Holy Redeemer School in Evergreen Park about the incident. But she says her outspokenness backfired. In the following weeks, her daughter was bullied at the Catholic school and administrators there eventually expelled her and her brother, then 7, according to the family. The family then filed a lawsuit over the dispute.

On Tuesday, nearly four years later, Bench and her husband, Michael, agreed to settle the suit shortly before jury selection was scheduled to begin at a trial in the Daley Center. The family said the Archdiocese of Chicago, which was also sued, agreed to pay them $40,000.

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The family wanted to proceed to trial but settled to protect their daughter, now 16, from testifying, Bench said.

“She was afraid,” the Evergreen Park mom said.

The archdiocese confirmed the settlement but declined to answer questions, instead issuing a statement saying it has a strong policy against bullying.

“Preventing bullying in our schools is essential to our mission,” Sister Mary Paul McCaughey, superintendent of schools for the archdiocese, was quoted as saying in the statement.

Bench said she witnessed the alleged physical assault of her daughter during the football game in September 2007.

“You cannot dole out physical punishment to these children,” she said. “Cheerleading is not a punishable sport. This just does not happen.”

But when she took the issue to school officials, her concerns fell on deaf ears, she said.

Bench didn’t let up, repeatedly contacting school officials for answers for about five weeks following the incident.

The bullying of her daughter worsened because her mom was griping, Bench said. Girls who had been friends with her daughter wouldn’t talk to her, called her names and even refused to pass the ball to her during school-sponsored basketball games, according to court documents.

“The whole dynamic had changed because her mom snitched about the cheerleading,” Bench said.

“I was humiliated. I was tormented every day,” the daughter said while being questioned by lawyers as part of the lawsuit. “I don’t even know how you can explain the feeling, but it feels like you want to be dead, and that nothing will help and that no one will help you.”

Eventually, Bench’s daughter as well as their son, then a second-grader, were expelled from the school because of the “actions of Mrs. Bench,” according to court documents. Bench said it was her persistence that led the school to kick her kids out.

bschlikerman@tribune.com

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-evergreen-park-family-settles-bullying-suit-with-archdiocese-20110816,0,6617603.story

The boy leaving court with his parents. Photo: Aja Styles

A so-called schoolyard “avenge” attack involving the secret recording and posting of a 14-year-old girl’s sexual acts on Facebook has earned a 17-year-old boy a year in juvenile detention.

The underage girl was victim to serious physical threats, including getting “mobbed” and would be “put in hospital” the next day at school, if she did not comply by indecently exposing and touching herself via a webcam.

The whole thing was recorded, unknown to her, and posted online for “everyone at school and the world to see”, a Perth Children’s Court magistrate said during his sentencing of the teenage boy, whose identity is protected by law.

Children’s Court Chief Magistrate Denis Reynolds said the boy, who was posing as a fellow male school student using a fake Facebook account, spent 1.5 hours pressuring the girl which went “beyond bullying” and left her scared and frightened.

“You were aggressive and threatening right from the start,” Mr Reynolds said. “…[Afterwards,] she felt sick and ashamed and she also felt her mum would be angry at her.”

And the reason, according to the boy’s submission to the court, was to get revenge on the boy whose identity he had stolen because he had picked on a friend.

But Mr Reynolds rejected the claim as the boy’s only motivation, and said the teenager had also gained sexual gratification from the recording because each time the girl did something he made her take it a step further.

He even tried to coax her into having sex with him in order to get the video removed from Facebook, Mr Reynolds said.

“Your behaviour showed a callous disregard for a vulnerable young female,” he said.

The girl was not the only one targeted, after the boy attempted similar acts with two other girls who managed to resist his threats. Mr Reynolds said there were also others who were planned to be targeted before the matter finally came to light.

The boy admitted to six charges, including forcing an underage girl to do an indecent act and the recording and distribution of child exploitation material, once police traced the crimes to his computer.

His mother, who is Iranian, made an impassioned plea to Mr Reynolds, saying, amidst her sobbing, that her son had never before done anything wrong and the whole family had been damaged by his actions.

“I am sorry to this girl, I have one daughter. I believe my son is guilty,” she said in broken English.

She also explained that as part of their Baha’i faith, sex was prohibited for those under the age of 18. The boy was also seen crying in the dock as he listened to his mother.

His lawyer Annie O’Neill said her client was sexually naive and his actions “had taken a life of its own” through the ease of utilising such a “dangerous tool” as Facebook. And he himself had been the subject of bullying through racist taunts.

Mr Reynolds said he didn’t know of any culture that would accept such behaviour, which he compared to adult offenders downloading pornographic child material.

He said in some way, the boy’s offences were worse because he created the material and had sought to humiliate and degrade young females.

Mr Reynolds said he was concerned about the long-term effects on the teenager’s victims and acknowledged the video may never be totally removed from the internet.

“It’s not virtual, it’s not virtual at all. It’s all very real,” he said.

The boy will get rehabilitation at Banksia Hill Detention Centre, while his family will also receive some emergency psychological counselling, according to Mr Reynolds.

The Palm Beach County School District reported thousands more incidents of bullying and harassment of students between 2007 and 2010 than any other school district in Florida.

But district officials say the numbers are not indicative of a growing bullying problem here. Rather, that they show district officials are taking the issue seriously.

“We’re knee deep in it and we’re trying our best,” said Kim Mazauskas, a resource teacher with the district’s Office of Safe Schools. “The numbers will go up when you address something.”

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Palm Beach County schools, which teach about 172,000 students, reported more than 5,600 incidents of bullying between 2007 and 2010, according to data provided by the state Department of Education.

David Benson, the assistant director for safe schools for the district, said one of the reasons the numbers of incidents are high is that the district is following the state’s guidelines, including reporting all incidents of bullying even if the claim is unsubstantiated.

State Department of Education spokeswoman Cheryl Etters said the state sends schools guidance, but how the numbers are reported varies greatly. She said some districts might be reporting bullying as other crimes, such as battery or fighting.

For example Miami-Dade County Public Schools, which has about 345,000 students, only reported one bullying incident in the 2007-2008 school year and seven incidents in the 2008-2009 school year before increasing to more than 800 incidents in 2009-2010.

Calls to the Miami-Dade County Public Schools Office of Safe Schools were referred to School Police Chief Charles Hurley, who did not return calls seeking comment.

Etters said that when the state Office of Safe Schools sees statistics that seem incorrect, they point out the issue and give the district a chance to change the numbers. But she said districts do not face any penalty for incorrect reporting.

Benson said there are nearly 200 schools, including all the charter schools in Palm Beach County, and there were about 2,000 incidents in 2009-2010, which works out to about 10 incidents of bullying per school.

“Our numbers seem much more realistic,” Benson said.

Mazauskas said the district has a website full of resources for students and teachers, such as scripts that guide teachers through how to respond to incidents such as cyber bullying.

Craig Goldenfarb is a West Palm Beach attorney who represents the parents of two students who are threatening to sue the Palm Beach County School District, alleging the district didn’t do enough to stop the bullying endured by those students at Jeaga Middle School and Seminole Trails Elementary School.

“At least they are reporting it here, which is good,” Goldenfarb said.

Jeaga Principal Kevin Gatlin said the district has made it easier for students to report bullying, such as creating “bullying boxes” where students can drop off anonymous complaints, as well as separate hotlines for each school.

Boca Raton Middle School consistently was among the Palm Beach County schools with the highest number of incidents. Benson, who used to be an assistant principal at Boca Raton Middle, said what that shows is that teachers and administrators had a good pulse of what was happening in the school and documented every incident.

Benson said the unofficial numbers being reported by schools for the 2010-2011 school year show a drop to 1,849 incidents.

“We are making progress,” Benson said.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/palm-beach/pb-palm-school-bullying-20110724,0,1062484.story

• Video
• Video

Advice for parents to help their children avoid the scourge of cyber-bullying (Video courtesy of Les Twentyman www.20thman.com.au)

‘Best Enemies’ a film about cyber bullies to be used in anti-bullying programs here and overseas.

NO SUPPORT: Dannii Sanders committed suicide after being subjected to bullying over the internet.
Source: Supplied

SHATTERED: Dannii Sanders’ parents Ray and Christine begged the authorities to take her into hospital.
Source: Supplied

Prev

 of 2

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THE parents of Dannii Sanders say it was the system – not Facebook – that let down their troubled 14-year-old daughter.

The stunning teen, who was bullied on the internet, took her own life on Tuesday in Caloundra, on the Sunshine Coast.

Her mother Christine and younger sister Monique, 12, discovered her in the bathroom following days of violent and aggressive behaviour.

Dannii’s death sparked an outpouring of grief among hundreds of friends in Sydney, which she had left days earlier to join her parents in Queensland.

Despite the cruel and vicious online taunts, Ray and Christine Sanders said Dannii was unfazed by the internet attacks and “gave it as good as she got it”.

Dannii’s real problem, they said, had gone undiagnosed and no authorities would help assess her.

The worried parents had begged medicos in two states to admit Dannii to hospital but were told she would have to go of her own free will.

Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.

End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.

Mrs Sanders twice submitted reports to the Department of Child Safety in NSW but received the same response.

Police in NSW and Queensland said their hands were tied.

“If we had the right to say we want her taken in, she’d probably be here today,” Mrs Sanders said. It’s not the police or the ambos, it’s the framework they have to work in. It’s the law. Dannii was a victim of the system.”

Tragically, Mrs Sanders said she was almost relieved when she found her daughter on Tuesday because she thought it might finally bring her help.

But it was too late.

“I don’t believe she wanted to die. She needed help and no one would help, and now I have all the help in the world – inundated,” Mrs Sanders said.

The grieving parents say it was only three months ago that their beautiful blonde-haired, blue-eyed daughter changed into a wild, violent and troubled teen.

Her personality swung from highs to lows.

She dyed her hair black, ran away from home, wagged school and hung around with the wrong crowd.

Mrs Sanders said the Dannii with black hair and hard eyes was not the Dannii they knew.

“She was blonde, with blue eyes, almost like purple and they sparkled when she was happy,” she said.

“She would eat and sleep and dance to music videos and bounce on her trampoline.”

Mr Sanders added: “She was like a frog, most innocent, very naive.”

Only last year Dannii travelled to Japan to represent Australia in trampolining, the sport that was her world for many years.

But towards the end of her life, she was banging her head against walls, stealing and hitting her mother.

Mrs Sanders, a hairdresser, said she wanted to bleach her daughter’s hair back to its natural colour for the funeral in Sydney on Wednesday which is also her father’s birthday.

The family will await a report from the coroner.

For support and information about suicide prevention, contact Lifeline 13 11 14 or www.lifeline.org.au or the SANE Helpline on 1800 18 SANE (7263) or www.sane.org

• Video
• Video

Advice for parents to help their children avoid the scourge of cyber-bullying (Video courtesy of Les Twentyman www.20thman.com.au)

‘Best Enemies’ a film about cyber bullies to be used in anti-bullying programs here and overseas.

NO SUPPORT: Dannii Sanders committed suicide after being subjected to bullying over the internet.
Source: Supplied

SHATTERED: Dannii Sanders’ parents Ray and Christine begged the authorities to take her into hospital.
Source: Supplied

Prev

 of 2

Next

THE parents of Dannii Sanders say it was the system – not Facebook – that let down their troubled 14-year-old daughter.

The stunning teen, who was bullied on the internet, took her own life on Tuesday in Caloundra, on the Sunshine Coast.

Her mother Christine and younger sister Monique, 12, discovered her in the bathroom following days of violent and aggressive behaviour.

Dannii’s death sparked an outpouring of grief among hundreds of friends in Sydney, which she had left days earlier to join her parents in Queensland.

Despite the cruel and vicious online taunts, Ray and Christine Sanders said Dannii was unfazed by the internet attacks and “gave it as good as she got it”.

Dannii’s real problem, they said, had gone undiagnosed and no authorities would help assess her.

The worried parents had begged medicos in two states to admit Dannii to hospital but were told she would have to go of her own free will.

Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.

End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.

Mrs Sanders twice submitted reports to the Department of Child Safety in NSW but received the same response.

Police in NSW and Queensland said their hands were tied.

“If we had the right to say we want her taken in, she’d probably be here today,” Mrs Sanders said. It’s not the police or the ambos, it’s the framework they have to work in. It’s the law. Dannii was a victim of the system.”

Tragically, Mrs Sanders said she was almost relieved when she found her daughter on Tuesday because she thought it might finally bring her help.

But it was too late.

“I don’t believe she wanted to die. She needed help and no one would help, and now I have all the help in the world – inundated,” Mrs Sanders said.

The grieving parents say it was only three months ago that their beautiful blonde-haired, blue-eyed daughter changed into a wild, violent and troubled teen.

Her personality swung from highs to lows.

She dyed her hair black, ran away from home, wagged school and hung around with the wrong crowd.

Mrs Sanders said the Dannii with black hair and hard eyes was not the Dannii they knew.

“She was blonde, with blue eyes, almost like purple and they sparkled when she was happy,” she said.

“She would eat and sleep and dance to music videos and bounce on her trampoline.”

Mr Sanders added: “She was like a frog, most innocent, very naive.”

Only last year Dannii travelled to Japan to represent Australia in trampolining, the sport that was her world for many years.

But towards the end of her life, she was banging her head against walls, stealing and hitting her mother.

Mrs Sanders, a hairdresser, said she wanted to bleach her daughter’s hair back to its natural colour for the funeral in Sydney on Wednesday which is also her father’s birthday.

The family will await a report from the coroner.

For support and information about suicide prevention, contact Lifeline 13 11 14 or www.lifeline.org.au or the SANE Helpline on 1800 18 SANE (7263) or www.sane.org