The concerns of a Damariscotta family about Great Salt Bay Community School’s approach to bullying engendered some controversy about the issue in recent weeks.
The controversy has played out publicly on social networking websites and, to a lesser extent, on the editorial page of The Lincoln County News.
The parents of a Great Salt Bay Community School student outlined their concerns in a Feb. 8 letter to Central Lincoln County School System Superintendent Steve Bailey.
The parents provided a copy of the letter to The Lincoln County News. In the letter, the parents asked Bailey to approve a transfer for their child to another school in the district.
The parents described their son as an honor roll student prior to enrolling at Great Salt Bay and outlined dozens of incidences of physical and psychological bullying during his two-plus years at the school.
The parents alleged that, among other things, several students repeatedly hurled their backpacks at the boy and broke his glasses, stole three backpacks from him and, in one case, told their son a relative who committed suicide did so “because he was born.”
The letter detailed the severe academic, emotional and psychological impact of the bullying.
The parents roundly criticized the school’s administration for its response to the incidents. Administrators frequently chose to punish their son (who, they acknowledged, often retaliated when provoked) while ignoring the students who bullied him, according to the letter.
“We see very little effort on GSB’s part to address the issue,” the parents wrote.
“They are not seeing this situation for what it really is and this is how bullying continues in schools causing kids to commit suicide,” they added later. “We want him transferred immediately into a safer, more constructive environment.”
Great Salt Bay Community School Principal Jeff Boston said privacy law prevents the school from discussing a specific student. He did, however, discuss the general topic of bullying at Great Salt Bay during a Feb. 23 interview with The Lincoln County News.
The Great Salt Bay School Committee adopted a bullying policy in 2006.
“Any student who engages in conduct that constitutes bullying shall be subject to disciplinary consequences up to and including suspension and expulsion,” according to the policy.
The school also distributes information about bullying and harassment procedures in a handbook parents and students receive at the beginning of the school year.
Bullying “is a national issue” and “has occurred here,” Boston said. Despite this fact, bullying is not unique to Great Salt Bay, and the school remains safe, he said.
“Prior to my coming here, it was a safe school. Since my coming here, it is a safe school and it will continue to be a safe school because we’re proactive in how we approach the situation,” Boston said.
The school works consistently to educate staff, students and the public about bullying.
At the beginning of the 2011-2012 academic year, Boston and Vice Principal Kim Schaff talked to staff about bullying awareness and procedures.
Sexual Assault Support Services of Midcoast Maine visits Great Salt Bay annually to educate students and teachers about harassment.
Last November, Schaff and Great Salt Bay social worker Rebecca Cannon made up one-half of a panel of local educators at the fourth annual Emil Landau Human and Civil Rights Forum. The topic: bullying.
“We’re out there,” Boston said. “We’re not hiding anything. We’re addressing it.”
Boston said the administration considers all sides when students recount different versions of an incident before it determines the proper response.
“In some cases where there haven’t been witnesses we’ve put them both on notice,” Boston said. “If there’s any further negative interactions we’ll investigate it further.”
The school has disciplinary procedures in place and utilizes the procedures as necessary.
The process usually starts with the issue of a notice of behavioral action, or NOBA, as school officials refer to it. The offending student serves a detention, usually after school, and fills out a form that asks them “to reflect on what they did and what they can do to improve their behavior in the future,” Boston said.
Other incidents result in an “in-house suspension for a day or a couple days depending on the infraction,” Boston said.
“We like to keep our kids in school,” Boston said. “Very rarely do we suspend our kids outside of school.”
“Our goal is to have [students] learn from their mistakes, because they are kids, and to have them be a productive member of our community,” Boston said.
Sometimes, the administration will call the students’ parents in for a meeting to discuss an incident and make the parents aware of the school’s need for their support.
Eventually, the school will involve law enforcement, as it has twice in Boston’s four years as principal. Police and parents will meet with the administrator and the student, a meeting that reinforces, for the student and his or her parents, the gravity of the situation.
This step sends the message that “This is a very, very serious issue and you need to be able to control your actions and, if not, this is the road you’re going down,” Boston said, and it has proven effective.
“It helped significantly,” in both cases, Boston said. One student graduated, while another remains at the school and hasn’t had any more issues.
The mother of the student at the heart of the controversy said her son has, in accordance with his parents’ request, transferred to another school in the district, where he is once again enjoying academic life.
She said she and her husband want their case to raise awareness, not divide the community.
“GSB is a great school with some amazing teachers who we will wholeheartedly miss,” the mother wrote in a statement e-mailed to The Lincoln County News.
She also delivered a call to action to other parents in the community.
“This is a great opportunity to talk to your kids about this topic and teach them that this behavior is not okay and to not only stand up for [themselves], but [to realize] it’s okay to tell someone when you see [bullying] happening,” she wrote.
Boston, too, stressed the critical role parents must play to prevent bullying.
“One of the contributing factors in making this a safe and successful school is the involvement of the community and especially the parents who are involved with their children’s education and communicate with the teachers and are proud of what the school does,” Boston said. “Through the communication, the school continues to thrive and be one that everyone is proud of.”
