Assignment 10

If I were a school principal, I would try to diminish bullying by employing a variety of approaches. First of all, bullies tend to be at large when there is a lack of adult supervision. I would make sure that recess, lunch time, and all extra curricular activities had adult supervision other than the normal adults, who were trained to notice bullying and put a controlled stop to it. Also, I would elect peer mediators for grades four and up, that their peers(victims and bullies themselves),would be able to bring conflicts to the mediator, and the situation could be worked out in a calm fashion. For older students, there would be absolutely no tolerance, and effective punishment (i.e., no ISS or OSS, some students want that as their punishment) would take place immediately. Students would also be able to talk to counselors or take problems to their teachers (who will have participated in effective bully handling workshops) to help work their problems out. Finally, as the principal, I would whole heatedly take upon the responsibility of supervising classrooms, recess, and cafeterias during lunch time myself, to make sure everything runs smoothly. This would be my approach and every technique would be effective in a perfect world, however, it is difficult to obtain absolute peace.