For children and youth to thrive in their schools and communities, they need to feel safe and be safe — socially, emotionally, and physically.
That is the opening sentence on BullyingInfo.org, a Web site created by the federal government’s Interagency Working Group on Youth Programs to identify and disseminate “promising and effective strategies” to combat bullying as well as to promote partnerships between stakeholders. And bullying, as research has shown, occurs in school buses just as it does on school campuses or elsewhere in the community. School bus drivers see it every day.
“We know that many programs are successfully addressing bullying and want to share those materials with others,” says Kevin Jennings, assistant deputy secretary for the U.S. Department of Education’s Education Department’s Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools who also chairs the Federal Partners in Bullying Prevention Task Force. “Our goal is to create an easy, central location for anyone to access information.”
The Federal Partners in Bullying Prevention Task Force is also using the site to accept field-based material or evaluated, evidence-based programs for addressing bullying. Submissions must be free of charge.
The call came last month, days before Education Secretary Arne Duncan highlighted best practices of bullying polices in a memo to state leaders.
