Anti-bullying campaign could save lives, says report

A NATIONAL anti-bullying programme in schools could help reduce the number of cases by more than one-fifth and even save lives, new research shows.

The Department of Education has expressed interest in developing such a scheme after the success of a pilot programme to combat bullying in Donegal. The Anti-Bullying Centre at Trinity College Dublin’s education department presented the findings of the trial programme in 42 primary schools last April. It resulted in:

A 21.5% reduction in pupils being victimised

A 24% fall in pupils admitting they bullied others.

The programme was implemented in schools in 1999-2000 at a cost of just €48,000, partly funded by the Department of Education.

Dr Mona O’Moore, co-ordinator of the Anti-Bullying Centre, said a national programme could be set up to train teachers and provide information material for primary school staff and parents for around €300,000.

“It’s encouraging to see from Donegal that, if you make the effort, you will get the results. It’s important to focus on catching children’s attention early so if you start in primary schools there should be less bullying in second level anyway,” said Dr O’Moore.

“There has been evidence of young people committing suicide as a result of bullying in the class or at school, so this would be money very well spent,” she said.

She said similar projects have been running since 1983 in Norway and they have been so successful the Government is confident it will have stamped out bullying in schools within three years.

A top official from Education Minister Noel Dempsey’s department wrote to Dr O’Moore last week. He told her that officers from the department’s research and in-career development units wish to discuss the proposal of a national programme to prevent and counter bullying.

Dr O’Moore was involved in the first nationwide study of bullying in Irish schools five years ago. It found that almost one-third of primary school pupils had been victimised in the last term, while more than one-quarter had bullied others in the school.

At second level, the corresponding figures were 16% and 15%, respectively.

It also found that many teachers were unaware of bullying in their classes or chose not to deal with it.