BATTLING BULLYING WITH COURAGEOUS SCHOOL CULTURE

STARTED 2005 FORMER EDITOR

VARSITY SOCCER COACH SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER

EXPERT WITNESS AUTHOR RAISING BULLY PROOF KIDS

RISK POOLS ENTIRE SCHOOL DISTRICTS

EXPERIENCED PROFOUND BULLYING MLK “ANTITHESIS STRONGLY MARKED”

THE PROTECTORS

AS NEWBY COACH…NO IDEA

LIFE’S A MOVIE WHAT’S YOUR CHILD’S ROLE?

WHY PROTECTORS/BYSTANDERS?

10-YEAR LANDMARK STUDY HEALTH & HUMAN SERVICES

HIGH COST LOW BEHAVIORDECREASED ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE 85% SCHOOL SHOOTINGS COST OF LAWSUITS PROFOUND MENTAL HEALTH PROBLEMS INCREASE CRIME AFTER GRADUATION INCREASE IN DRUG & ALCOHOL ABUSE EATING DISORDERS LOWER MORALE STAFF & STUDENTS

#1FormofChildAbuse#1ConcernParents&Students*AnxietyDisorders,Depression,agoraphobia,suicidalthoughtswellintoadulthood*AltersDNA:GeneMoodRegulation*

Source: Harris Poll Sept 2011 Source: Duke University 2013

Source: Journal Psychological Medicine Dec 2012

WHERE IS COURAGEOUS SCHOOL CULTURE FOUND?

COURAGE: GREATEST OF ALL VIRTUES

WE ONLY BECOME BRAVE BY DOING BRAVE ACTS. ARISTOTLE

“QUALITY OF OUR LIVES EXPANDS OR CONTRACTS BASED UPON THE COURAGE WE POSSESS.” MOTHER TERESA

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KINDESS NOT ENOUGH

BULLYING MYTHS…CONFLICT ANGER MANAGEMENT MISUNDERSTANDING DRAMA TWO PEOPLE CAN’T GET ALONG

S everal years ago a youth counselor told me about the dilemma he faced when dealing with violent young men. His direct impressions simply didn’t match what he had been taught. He saw his violent clients as egotists with a grandiose sense of personal superiority and entitlement, but his textbooks told him that these young toughs actually suffered from low self-esteem. He and his staff decided they couldn’t go against decades of research, regardless of what they had observed, and so they tried their best to boost the young men’s opinions of themselves, even though this produced no discernible reduction in their antisocial tendencies.

The view that aggression stems from low self-es-teem has long been common knowledge. Counselors, social workers and teachers all over the country have been persuaded that improving the self-esteem of young people is the key to curbing violent behavior and to encouraging social and academic success. Many schools have students make lists of reasons why they are won-derful people or sing songs of self-celebration. Many parents and teachers are afraid to criticize kids, lest it cause serious psychological damage and turn some promising youngster into a dangerous thug or pathetic loser. In some sports leagues, everyone gets a trophy.

A number of people have questioned whether these feel-good exercises are really the best way to build self-esteem. But what about the underlying assumption? When my colleagues and I began looking into the mat-ter in the early 1990s, we found article after article citing the “well-known fact” that low self-esteem

causes violence. Yet we were unable to fi nd any book or paper that offered a formal statement of that theory, let alone empirical evidence to support it. Everybody knew it, but nobody had proved it.

Unfortunately for the low-self-esteem theory, re-searchers have gradually built up a composite image of what it is like to have low self-esteem, and that image does not mesh well with what we know about aggres-sive perpetrators. People who have a negative view of themselves are typically muddling through life, trying to avoid embarrassment, giving no sign of a desperate need to prove their superiority. Aggressive attack is risky; people with low self-esteem tend to avoid risks. When people with low self-esteem fail, they usually blame themselves, not others.

Faced with these incongruities, we cast about for an alternative theory. A crucial infl uence on our thinking was the seemingly lofty self-regard of prominent violent people. Saddam Hussein is not known as a modest, cau-tious, self-doubting individual. Adolf Hitler’s exaltation of the “master race” was hardly a slogan of low self-esteem. These examples suggest that high self-esteem, not low, is indeed an important cause of aggression.

We eventually formulated our hypothesis in terms of threatened egotism. Not all people who think highly of themselves are prone to violence. That favorable opinion must be combined with some external threat to the opinion. Somebody must question it, dispute it, undermine it. People like to think well of themselves, and so they are loath to make downward revisions in their self-esteem. When someone suggests such a revi-

54 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN MIND August/September 2006

PHOTOGRAPHS BY TINA WEST

VIOLENTPRIDEDO PEOPLE TURN VIOLENT BECAUSE OF SELF-HATE, OR SELF-LOVE? BY ROY F. BAUMEISTER

COPYRIGHT 2006 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, INC.

Myth of Low Self-Esteem Self-Hate or Self-Love?

KIDS WHO BULLY…“PLAYGROUND BULLIES REGARD THEMSELVES AS SUPERIOR TO OTHER CHILDREN…LOW SELF-ESTEEM IS FOUND AMONG VICTIMS, BUT NOT AMONG BULLIES THEMSELVES.”

ANGER MANAGEMENT?…

WHAT BULLIES REALLY BELIEVE: I’M MORE IMPORTANT THAN YOU!

THE FACTS:CRUELTY=SOCIAL CURRENCY SUPERIOR POWER INTENDING TO HARM FOR NO GOOD REASON HUMILIATION, THREAT FURTHER ABUSE DOESN’T MAKE US STRONGER NOT PART “JUST WORLD THEORY”

SWIMMING UPSTREAM

HOW IS THIS A SCHOOL PROBLEM? $50M

$225K PER EPISODE

IT’S ABOUT THE RING

YOUR SCHOOL NEEDS EYE & EAR WITNESSES

TATTLING OR

REPORTING?

STOP!T & ANONYMOUS REPORTING

THEOLOGIAN JOHN WAYNE: “COURAGE IS BEING AFRAID TO SADDLE UP BUT SADDLING UP

ANYWAY.”

‘ONLY THE GODS ARE COURAGEOUS IN ISOLATION…’

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ASCH EXPERIMENT

2 R STRONGER THAN 1

¡ “Heroesarethosewhocansomehowresistthepowerofthesituationandactoutofnoblemotives,orbehaveinwaysthatdonotdemeanotherswhentheyeasilycan.”

¡ Dr.PhillipZimbardo,StanfordPrisonExperiment

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GROW PROTECTORS/HEROES

WANT TO BE HEROES

WANT CARING KIDS? CHANGE PARENTING

DINNER TABLE THIS WEEKEXPECT YOUR CHILD TO REPORT [NOT TATTLE] EXPECT YOUR CHILD TO COMFORT EXPECT YOUR CHILD TO INTERVENE BOYCOTT TRASH TV

TIME FOR VITAMIN A

CYBERBULLYING MEET CYBERSUPPORTING

CYBERBULLYING MEET CYBERSUPPORTINGQUARTERBACK KEVIN CURWICK STARTED @OSSEONICETHINGS

HOW AMEND SCHOOL CULTURE?CELEBRATE MORAL/ETHICAL COURAGE PUT MORAL/ETHICAL COURAGE ON YOUR SCHOOL’S RADAR: COLUMN IN NEWSPAPER/GUEST SPEAKERS/THANK YOU LETTERS/SCHOOL PLAYS NOT JUST KINDNESS: COURAGEOUS KINDNESS ANONYMOUS REPORTING PARTNER WITH PEOPLE OF GOODWILL GET TO PARENTS PLEDGES WORK

HOW AMEND SCHOOL CULTURE?START PROTECTORS FREEDOM COUNCIL MAP BULLYING ‘HOT SPOTS’ GET SPORTS PROGRAMS ON BOARD FROM BEGINNING TEACH TARGETS HOW TO APPEAR LESS ATTRACTIVE TO BULLIES (POWER POSING) NO MORE BULLYING TV PLEDGE HELP WITH FRIENDSHIPS CLUBS FOR THE “REST OF THE KIDS” EX. MOUNTAIN BIKING

BATTLING BULLYING WITH COURAGEOUS SCHOOL CULTURE

WWW.THEPROTECTORS.ORG