Teaching Advocacy To Young People
Interviewing with Rosaland was delightful! She was kind, thoughtful, and insightful in her approach to the topic of bullying of students. The focus of part one of her new series is on students, with an emphasis on advocacy. Below is an excerpt, followed by a link to the full article.
Part One: Bullying – At School, At Work It’s On The Rise
By Rosaland Tyler Associate Editor New Journal and Guide
If you are being bullied by a boss, a co-worker, a relative, a romantic mate, or a fellow student, you are more likely to develop hypertension, colitis, chronic fatigue syndrome, diabetes or a skin disorder.
In a four-part series, the New Journal and Guide will examine bullying because a recent report by Do Something.org showed that 3.2 million students are bullied each year. Meanwhile, 53.5 million adults are bullied at work each year, according to the Workplace Bullying Institute. Since records show that many people are being bullied at work, at school, at home, or elsewhere, it is important to understand that you have the right to feel safe.
“This is the first rule we stress,” Julie Hertzog, director of PACER’s National Bullying Prevention Center, said in a recent phone interview from her office in Minneapolis. “The No. 1 rule we stress to kids is that this is not a problem you are responsible for fixing but someone on the local level is responsible for fixing it.”
Hertzog added, “We look up local and state laws and urge them to talk to an adult. If they are told, ‘Just ignore it.’ We come back with facts. We tell them you have these rights, if you don’t feel safe at school. We also teach self-advocacy, which is a three-step process.”
“No. 1 – we ask the student to describe what is happening now. No. 2 – we ask how would you like the situation to be? No. 3 – we ask how would you make the situation different and who do you need to contact to create this difference?”
