By: Tyler Markland
MARTINSBURG — A kickoff event at War Memorial Park drew hundreds of people Thursday evening to raise awareness and foster a supportive community in the fight against school bullying.
While the kickoff event has been a time-honored tradition in Berkeley County for around 10 years now, this year’s event was extra special, celebrating the county’s new, homegrown anti-bullying program.
The district is ditching the old Olweus Bullying Prevention program in favor of one more tailored to the problems facing Berkeley County, focused on building positive peer interactions and improving the climate and culture of the school community.
Elice Gregory, BCS director of student support services, said the foundation for Olweus is solid and inspired some parts of the new program, but updates to it needed to happen, which eventually led leadership at BCS to make the program its own.
“We are the fastest-growing school district in the state, soon to become the No. 1-populated school district, as far as students from the state, and so, we decided to make it our own,” Gregory said. “We were listening to feedback, and some of the materials and resources were a little outdated.”
The new program has four main components, including “interventions,” which references consequences for bullying, in addition to class meetings, school family and community. Gregory said the “school family” element is especially important, since students interreact with more than just their teachers at school.
“Every single person in the school is important as an adult, because students sometimes will build a relationship with cafeteria staff — it might be an aide in the classroom, it might be their bus driver,” Gregory said.
Including parents is also a major goal for the new program. A brochure about the program includes a list of things parents can do about bullying, including actions like sharing concerns with the child’s school, encouraging students to spend time with friendly students in their class and helping the child meet new friends outside of school.
“It’s really important that the message is a shared message and that we’re all united against bullying this year,” Gregory said.
Throughout the week, students in schools across the county talked about bullying prevention in their classes and during larger events focused on making them more aware of those issues.
During the kickoff event on Thursday evening, multiple bands from local schools played, drawing an enormous crowd to the park. Various local organizations, like Berkeley County Teen Court, also attended at the event.
More information about the new program is available online at https://www.berkeleycountyschools.org/page/bcs-bullying-prevention-program.