School Bullies

We must not allow bullies in schools because they detract from the school's mission. 

Bullies are kids; kids have parents. Parents are responsible for their kids' behavior in school. 

Schools need to notify parents after each incident of their child bullying another child in order to give them an opportunity to correct the problem themselves. 

After each incident the school needs to escalate its involvement with the parents.  The first warning needs to include a tip sheet for teaching their kids not to bully other kids, as well as the consequences for the child and the parents if the child continues to bully other kids. By the way, the warning and related information needs to be communicated from the school directly to the parent by phone and registered mail, NOT sent via the child as a take-home note. 

The school's involvement with the parents should focus on educating the child and the parents on bullying and how to prevent it. This may involve discovering and solving any issues that are present in the child's home that foster or contribute to the bullying behavior. 

If educating and helping doesn't work, then punishments for the child and parents should start with effort or time-based punishments and then escalate to monetary fines and expulsion.  Effort and time-based punishments are fair across all economic backgrounds. They hit busy parents the hardest which is good because it will make those parents rethink how they spend their time, and hopefully lead them to invest their time in their children until the problem is solved.

Suspension should not be used because it provides a sort of vacation for the child which may actually be received as a reward, encouraging future bad behavior, and when a child is suspended too often he or she may fall behind academically and that pressure can also foster bad behavior. 

Consequences for subsequent incidents should include:

1. the child writing an essay about why it is wrong to bully

2. the parents writing an essay about what techniques they are using at home to teach the child not to bully others

3. the child attending counseling about his or her behavior for some minimum number of sessions

4. the parents attending a course on parenting specifically geared towards teaching their child not to bully

5. additional duties for the child at school, such as supervised cleaning or gardening

6. additional duties for the parents at school, such as road guard, cleaning, or gardening.

7. monetary fines for the parents - small enough to be affordable, large enough to get them motivated to spend time with their kids on modifying their behavior. The fines should be payable to the state, not the school.  The fines should increase with every subsequent incident. If the parents say they can't afford the fines, allow a payment plan. Any outstanding amount from any grade level starting at kindergarten must be reported to the state and the state should add it to the parent's next tax bill. This arrangement must be part of the enrollment contract.  

8. expel the child from school.  If the principal believes that no amount of fines will deter the bullying behavior, the best thing to do is to expel the child. The parents can then pay for private school or try home-schooling. If the child is expelled with fines outstanding, the state should add those fines to the parent's next tax bill. 

The point is that the state is providing free education for all children. In order to make it work, children need to behave appropriately at school. Teachers already do a lot to teach children how to behave at school but various factors at home can greatly affect their behavior. Parents are ultimately responsible for their children's education and behavior at school. If the child is causing a problem for other children at school, then parents need to fix it. If they don't, the problem needs to become their problem. It's not fair to the other children to suffer a bully.