• Bully-Free Schools: Circles of Support

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    Effective peer aggression prevention, including bullying prevention, requires a systems approach that impacts the climate and culture of a school as a whole. An effective comprehensive systems-approach includes the following four major components:

    1)    Positive school climate, characterized by “warmth, positive interest, and involvement by adults” and adults acting as “authorities and positive role models” (Olweus, 1993);

    2)    Clear limits and consequences, characterized by “firm limits to unacceptable behavior and non-hostile, nonphysical negative consequences” (Olweus, 1993), and consequences that teach alternative ways to solve problems and achieve goals;

    3)    Social/Emotional Learning and Skill-Building, characterized by the implementation of formal and informal strategies to a) develop sense of community, b) promote peer norms supportive of social justice, and c) teach friendship and other social/ emotional skills to students through Michigan Model for Health® K-12, and

    4)    Parent and community partnerships, characterized by open communication and shared efforts to promote the healthy youth development of students.
     
     
    Efforts to create a safe and supportive school for all students will be optimized when the school functions as an aligned system where all the members, programmatic components, and policy and procedures are coordinated, guided by the same underlying principles and working toward the same goals.
     
     
    How Does This Fit With Coordinated School Health?

    One of the goals of Coordinated School Health (CSH) is to provide students with an optimal learning environment––one that promotes physical and emotional safety for all students. plays an integral role in creating a safe and supportive school climate where students can learn. While it may never be possible to say a school is “free” of bullying and other forms of peer aggression, a Healthy School Environment can substantially decrease these behaviors by

    1). actively promoting physical and emotional safety, and

    2. responding with effective forms of intervention when students or adults engage in disrespectful or hurtful behaviors.

     
    Take A Preview 
     

    1 Hour Overview Presentation: Click here (ppt version 97-03)

     
    For more information or to ask questions, please contact Lisa Jo Gagliardi (906)-632-3373 ext. 132  
     
Last Modified on October 18, 2018