School boards should consider policies on 'cyber-bullying'

To some extent, it’s classic bullying -- but in a new medium that expands the opportunities for mischief: John receives a text message on his cell phone warning him to “watch his back” at school tomorrow. Jane discovers that classmates have created a “Hate Jane” website where people can post derogatory comments about her. Someone steals Mary’s computer password and e-mails a break-up letter to her boyfriend -- signed, of course, in Mary’s name.

For the targets of such acts, the psychological harm is just as real as that experienced when bullying occurs at school. But cyber-bullying adds some new and painful twists: For one, it is easier to mask acts of bullying in anonymity -- such as an unsigned post to an online social network. And, unlike on-campus bullying, cyber-bullying can be directed at a child 24 hours a day and humiliate the victim in a worldwide venue.

Students targeted by cyber-bullies could be more likely to skip school, have declining academic performance, and be depressed.

Cyber-bullying has the potential to leave a child miserable, discourage a child from attending school, result in declining academic performance -- or worse. In Vermont a few years ago, a 13-year-old boy hanged himself after enduring months of cyber-bullying from classmates.

Cyber-bullying is far more common than most educators realize. Some studies report that anywhere from 20 to 40 percent of middle and high school students have been the victim of at least one instance of online bullying.

Such statistics are catching the attention of school officials: The Pasco County, Fla., school system recently updated its student code of conduct to clarify that bullying by electronic means -- “interactive and digital technologies or cell phones” -- will be treated as seriously as the traditional schoolyard variety.

Yet, educators in Pasco County -- as well as elsewhere across the nation -- are pondering just how far they can go to police students’ online activity.

“This is an emerging issue,” said NSBA Staff Attorney Thomas Hutton. “The well-being of students is at stake, but school districts are not the arbitrators of the Internet.”

Legal experts tend to agree that school officials are on solid ground to respond when a clear link can be shown between the bullying and school. For example, a student who uses a camera-equipped cell phone to take a picture of an undressed student in a school locker room and send it to fellow students -- or who uses a school computer to send mean-spirited e-mails to other students -- can be disciplined for on-campus misbehavior.

The greater challenge is when cyber-bullying occurs totally off-campus. For example, a lot of teenage social activity is taking place on instant messaging networks, blog sites, private web sites, and a host of online social networks, such as My Space.com, Xanga.com, and Facebook.com, said Nancy Willard, executive director of the Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use.

As they do at school, students use these sites to build their social status by cozying up to those higher up the social ladder -- and trying to denigrate or exclude others.

With no clear connection to school, some officials opt to take no action out of fear of overstepping their authority and running into free-speech issues. At most, they might confront students and inform parents to give them an opportunity to resolve the issue.

When off-campus activity appears to be criminal or raise the prospect of violence, school officials are more likely to respond. In Easthampton, N.Y., for example, an 18-year-old student this spring was charged with harassment and second-degree breach of the peace for allegedly threatening local students on MySpace.

“The burden is on the school district to show that the cyber-bullying has a significant impact on the school,”.Hutton said. There’s also a risk that if you do intervene in off-campus activity, you may be assuming some responsibility for policing other activity that happens off campus. Someone might turn around and sue you for failing to intervene.”

The legal uncertainties surrounding cyber-bullying does not mean school officials are powerless to intervene, said Lizette Alexander, Pasco County’s director of student services. It is certainly within the purview of school officials to inform parents about a problem and offer mediation to resolve it.

“We are not policing the Internet,” she said. “But when things come to our attention that adversely impact the learning climate or sense of security for any of our students, we take that very seriously.”

Michael Dickerson, spokes­person for the Henrico County, Va., school system, recommends that school administrators closely monitor students’ use of school computers, as well as educate students about the damaging impact of cyber-bullying. His district recently included cyber-bullying as a violation of the student code of conduct .

School officials also can intervene by contacting online service providers and reporting activity that violates the firms’ “terms of use” rules. Many will remove inappropriate material and even bar misbehaving users from their websites.

Parry Aftab, a New York-based attorney and consultant who has set up a website on cyber-bullying, said school officials should be far more proactive in stopping cyber-bullying.

She suggests an anticyber-bullying campaign that emphasizes the message that off-campus behavior can lead to escalating conflict that spills over into the schools. She also advises officials to ask parents and students to sign a contract agreeing not to engage in cyber-bullying.