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Opinion:
Bullying is on the rise, survey shows. How did we get here?
The severe and lasting consequences for victims
by Jen Wilka
September 24, 2018
I have been thinking a lot lately about bullying in schools, as a
parent, citizen and executive director of a nonprofit that works
closely with educators across the nation. I know that many of us have
been.
My organization, YouthTruth, has analyzed insights about bullying from
survey responses of more than 180,000 students in grades 5-12 across 37
states. We’ve learned that most bullying still happens in person (not
online), and that the top three reasons students felt they were bullied
included their appearance, their race or skin color, and because other
students thought they were gay. Overall, just over one in four students
in 2016 said they had been bullied in school.
Over the last year in particular, however, many of my educator
colleagues around the country were feeling like there was more to the
story. They were looking at their own “student voice” data and wanted
to know: Is bullying increasing just at my school, or is this part of a
larger trend? How did we get here? Who is being bullied, and why?
Emboldened by these conversations, we recently took a fresh look at our
latest bullying data to better understand this shifting landscape.
Our analysis of anonymous perception data from more than 160,000
students in 27 states, collected in partnership with hundreds of
schools over the past three years, revealed that bullying is indeed on
the rise. Thirty-three percent of students, or one in three, reported
being bullied in the 2017-18 school year — up from just over one in
four two years ago.
Schools in which more than half of the student population was white had
higher rates of bullying. In these schools, 36 percent of students
reported being bullied, compared to 32 percent in schools in which the
student body was over 50 percent students of color.
Within majority-white schools, students of color experienced a
concerning and sharper increase in bullying between the 2016-17 and
2017-18 school years compared to white students. While white students
saw an increase of three percentage points, students of color saw an
uptick of seven percentage points. Looking at the 2017-18 data, at
schools with a majority of students of color, race is more frequently
cited as a reason for being bullied than it is at majority-white
schools.
Our 2017-18 data also showed that middle-school students experienced
bullying at higher rates than did high-school students — nearly 40
percent, compared to 27 percent.
Student feedback reveals that bullying is evolving, and not in the way
we’d like. The new statistic of one in three students reporting being
bullied represents an increase of five percentage points over the last
two academic years. This is extremely concerning.
“There is so much we can learn when we not only ask students about
their experiences, but also listen deeply and react promptly to what we
hear. Indeed, listening to students is the first step in building the
knowledge, dialogue and action needed to stop bullying in our schools.”
Furthermore, the fact that bullying is more prevalent in majority-white
schools, and has increased more sharply for students of color within
these schools, is distressing. But knowing how bullying is changing,
and for whom, is powerful. Building equitable and inclusive schools
where all students feel safe and supported requires that educators
understand these differences.
This is something we all need to talk about. We know that bullying can
have severe and lasting consequences — emotional, mental and academic —
on students, and in the most heartbreaking cases can even lead to
suicide. And we know that students who bully others are at increased
risk for substance abuse, academic problems and violence later in life.
We also know that a positive school environment is crucial to student
success and can help close the achievement gap.
Students are not always considered front-line experts as we work to
make our schools and classrooms safe spaces for learning. But they
should be. Asking students directly and anonymously for feedback is
incredibly powerful. There is so much we can learn when we not only ask
students about their experiences, but also listen deeply and react
promptly to what we hear. Indeed, listening to students is the first
step in building the knowledge, dialogue and action needed to stop
bullying in our schools.
This story about social and emotional learning, as well as race and
equity, was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent
news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education.
Jen Wilka is executive director of YouthTruth, a national nonprofit
that harnesses student perceptions to help K-12 educators accelerate
improvements in their schools and classrooms.
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