Solution To The Bullying Problem In The United States

As defined by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, “bullying is unwanted, aggressive behavior among school aged children that involves a real or perceived power imbalance.”1 Bullying has become an epidemic nationwide that has allowed programs to be developed in hopes of finding a solution. Bullying is found within many different arenas, in which school being the number one place it exists the most. School is a construct that encompasses all students with no bias placed on age, gender, or race involving their participation. Climate denotes the environment that students are placed within a school. Bullying appears to be worst during early adolescence and “there is compelling evidence that the impact of bullying has lifelong debilitating …show more content…
School size, racial composition, school setting (urban or rural), do not appear to have a direct impact on bullying behaviors, their victims, and the type of abuse that occurs within school settings. Bullying is also not a program strictly isolated in the United States. Many countries throughout the world including, Japan, Great Britain, and Norway have had long going research and anti-bullying campaigns to combat and provide students, teachers, and parents with understanding and intervention strategies. Today in the United States many school districts have also taken a zero tolerance policy toward bullying in their own campaign against bullying. A lot of progress has been made by addressing the issues that surrounds bullying behaviors. The bullying behaviors impact an individual’s education and personal mental health in negative ways and they affect both the victim of bullying and bully both. To combat bullying behaviors all schools should adapt a zero tolerance policy towards any and all forms of bullying. Teachers, students, parents, and all staff members should be educated about the effects, signs, and preventative steps to take to stop bullying behaviors within their school. According to recent research study about teachers’ perceptions of bullying, it was found that all of the teachers who participated viewed bullying as a problem in varying degrees, but all viewed bullying as a problem. (Dahlheimer, 2004) This helps to provide evidence that bullying within schools is a tremendous problem that need the collective support of teachers, parents, and students to work together to create a safe and pro-social environment. All must work together to provide students with an education that is respectful and safe for all students to reach their true learning potential and social and emotional