Bullying is the number-one topic on an anonymous statewide hotline geared to kids, said Jo McGuire, program manager for the non-profit Safe2Tell initiative.
At a two-day conference aimed at increasing school safety,McGuire said 43 percent of the hotline calls are to report bullying incidents such as shoving or tripping kids. Many school violence issues are related to bullying, she added.
“If you have a planned school threat, in some way, shape or form, it’s a product of bullying,” McGuire said.
Developing strategies to prevent school violence was the focus for more than 250 law enforcement, school and mental health workers participating at the “Safe Schools–The Next Generation” conference, which ends today at the Marriott Conference Center near Park Meadows Mall.
Organizer Jeanne M. Smith, director of the Colorado Department of Public Safety, said it is the first time the various communities have come together to talk about keeping schools safe.
Attorney General John Suthers urged the group to “rededicate ourselves” to improving school safety.
The focus on school violence that followed Columbine eight years shifted after Sept. 11, 2001, when schools began focusing on threats from abroad, he said. “I think we understandably lost some focus in regard to the compelling need to continually scrutinize our schools.”
He urged school officials to do a “self-audit” to make sure a school has an emergency crisis plan; a threat-assessment team; resources officers trained as first responders; tip lines like safe2Tell; a bullying prevention program; and an agreement to share information with law enforcement and other agencies.
Mike Mayo, safety manager for Denver Public Schools, said the best way to prevent school violence is “observation.”
“We can’t be in 150 schools,” he said of the state’s second-largest district. School employees need to tell others if they notice something “that’s not quite right,” with a kid.
Del Elliot, director of the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence at the University of Colorado, said students need to feel safe to succeed academically.
“If no one intervenes, it creates this sense of not being safe because it could happen to them,” he said. Staff writer Karen Rouse can be reached at 303-954-1684 or at krouse@denverpost.com.
