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Education class urges Minnesota legislators to amend anti-bullying bill
By Jenny Woods
June 15, 2009
Jill Long, an assistant professor in the Education Department at St. Kate's, and her "Relationship Techniques" class last fall played a role in the bullying bill that was passed by the state Legislature but vetoed May 23 by Gov. Tim Pawlenty.
Long's course focuses on preparing pre-service teachers to manage a classroom, and the course covers the topic of bullying in schools, from preschool through high school (P-12). Twelve of her students participated in the research process: Mary Catherine Anderson, Shannon Baker, Mary Blissenbach, Alaine Clawson, Dana Dinger, Jennifer Johnson, Leslie Krizak, Mallory Schwartzrock, Emma Tressler, Patricia Ehrenberg, Laura Fay and Kathryn Knutson.
Q. How did you first become involved with the bullying bill?
A. A parent, Mary Whitescarver, wrote a letter. Her son had been bullied, and she decided she was going to contact Sen. Chuck Wiger (DFL-Maplewood). At the same time, he had happened to hear a radio interview I did last August on bullying. He got ahold of me and suggested that I meet with this parent who had come forward.
Mary and I started talking, and she had Phyl Burger of the Bully Police on board. The Bully Police is a grassroots support group of parents and families.
At the suggestion of Sen. Wiger, I got in contact with Walter Roberts, a faculty member in the counseling and student personnel office at Minnesota State University-Mankato. He had previously done some work on bullying and was well-versed in how this whole process works.
Sen. Wiger also got me in contact with the Dakota County Attorney's Office. They institute a lot of [anti-bullying] programs and have created many brochures and presentations. We all formed this group. I took it as far as I did because of the education course I teach called "Relationship Techniques." It's basically about classroom management. We talk about bullying and ways teachers implement different kinds of strategies and programs to address it. It was a natural fit for my class.
Q. How did your students get involved with Sen. Wiger and his work?
A. We decided we wanted to bring some concrete data, some research, into our meeting with Sen. Wiger. The students were digging up articles and statistics. They were contacting school district offices asking whether they had bullying policies, whether they could have copies of those, whether the policies were accessible online. They were trying to figure out as much as they could.
Q. How many public school districts did your students survey about their bullying policies?
A. We broke the state into regions and the students randomly selected about 30 districts from that region.
Q. What was the timeline for the students' research?
A. It was about a month. It was pretty intense, and this was all above and beyond coursework. They really stepped up to the plate.
Q. What were the findings?
A. It was a free-for-all. Because the state already had a law saying you have to have a bullying policy, the school districts all had written policies. How they implemented that was up to each district. There wasn't a program they had to use, there weren't specific criteria for measuring whether it was working.
That was the concern: Now that you have a policy, what are you going to do with it? How are you following through on this? Just because you have the policy written, is there evidence that less bullying is going on? Can you prove that? So we were finding out that they can't.
Q. When you and your students met with Sen. Wiger last fall, what reasons did you give as to why the current bullying law for Minnesota schools needs to be revised?
A. First and foremost, bullying is a huge issue in schools and it affects everyone, not just the ones being bullied but the bullies themselves as well as family members. Bullying deeply affects learning.
Second, we saw the inconsistencies of how the current bullying bill was implemented in P-12 schools. Some schools had comprehensive plans that were implemented, but others had virtually nothing in place. This is of importance to pre-service teachers, as they need to be not only prepared but also have an understanding of how the bill is being implemented in schools.
Q. What recommendations did your research team want to see included in the amended bill?
A. We recommended:
- 1. Responsibilities (list of stakeholders with defined roles and responsibilities),
2. Accountability (including the steps that should be taken in cases where bullying is reported). We were looking at addressing how to enforce these responsibilities.
3. Reporting system (this is a subset of accountability).
Q. Because the students' research was separate from their coursework and didn't count for credit, why did they decide to become involved?
A. First, as teachers they will encounter this in schools. We had rich discussions about our findings during many class sessions.
Secondly, many students had a personal connection to bullying. One student [Jennifer Johnson] helped create and implement an anti-bullying program in high school. She then was part of group that went to local grade schools to educate students on bullying using the program. Another student had a family member who was bullied. There were many other personal connections. Bullying affects everyone!
Q. What other contributions did you make on this project?
A. While preparing to teach about bullying in schools to pre-service teachers, I spent a great deal of time in schools talking with teachers and students. In addition, I researched particular anti-bullying programs utilized in schools.
Q. You've said that School District 166 in Cook County has a strong anti-bullying program. What are its strengths?
Sen. Wiger led me to this district. What impressed me was the community-based effort being implemented. Many community partnerships were in place. I would be interested in tracking this [program] long term.
Q. How did your research contribute to the final bill authored by Sen. Scott Dibble (DFL-Minneapolis)?
A. Another group was working with Sen. Dibble on the harassment piece -- which directly correlates with bullying -- with the GLBT community. We met with Sen. Dibble and that group. They had done much work in amending the current bullying bill to protect all people. Our team gave recommendations to include language specific to students in P-12 schools.
Q. What were some of the highlights of the process?
A. I found out so much about my students. They shared all these personal stories with Sen. Wiger. And it was really powerful, because that's what gets people's attention. That's what makes people stop and think -- when real people can be connected to these stories.
Contact Julie Michener, (651) 690-6521
