Here’s a new slant on the cluster of suicides of four teenage girls from Schenectady High School, New York, that was stimulated by abuse and bullying in school and a war-zone environment outside school.
Instead of working together to transform the school and the neighborhood environment, Rev. Veron House, pastor of the Life Changes World Ministries in Schenectady, and school superintendent, Eric Ely, are arguing over who was to blame and who should be responsible for fixing the problem.
Rev. House has been quoted as saying, “This is not a community problem, this is not a church problem, this is a school problem, and this is becoming a school epidemic because everyone that has done this is from Schenectady High.”
On the defensive, Superintendent Ely responded, “We’re not the parents of these children. We have them a third of the time, parents have them two thirds of the time. We’re going to do everything we can to keep it from happening. But ultimately, when a child goes home and takes their life, there’s not a whole lot a school employee can do about that.”
Who’s right? Of course both of them are right. But facing each other with finger-pointing makes both of them wrong.
The useful question is not who’s to blame and who should be punished, the people in the neighborhood or the principal and teachers in school. The better question is how to bring people together after numerous and tremendously painful deaths, in order to create a community that simply won’t tolerate hate and violence in the school or on the streets. Here in Denver, after the massacre at Columbine High School, it has taken 10 years for that healing spirit to become evident.
This question is not new. The difficulty of establishing a safe and functional communal life after multiple, horrible deaths has been part of human struggles since the beginning of time. For example, we see the same struggle in the families of Romeo and Juliet.
Even further back, the same subject and a wise solution are described in graphic detail in the three tragedies called the Oresteia, written by Aeschylus in 458 BC. In the Agamemnon, the Libation Bearers and the Eumenides, the murders are for different reasons than in Schenectady and Columbine High School, but the end effect is the same. Violent death rips apart the fabric of a community and people struggle with what to do.
Why do I bring up literature that’s 2,500 years old? Because the violence of today has also been faced by people in all cultures, times and places, and we have recorded the approaches that only lead to more pain and also the wisdom that points the way to solutions.
Aeschylus shows that the age-old solution – pointing fingers, apportioning blame, imposing punishment, retribution and vengeance – only drives people into separate, warring camps and perpetuates the cycle of violence. He shows that only after the people involved have come together, having been transformed by the intense pain and suffering that everyone feels underneath their defensive and hostile poses, can they dedicate themselves to change the environment together. One line from the tragedy is, “We must suffer, suffer into [wisdom].”
As community leaders, Rev. House and Superintendent Ely are failing in their responsibility. Instead of analyzing and parsing out the blame, they must lead the community to come together to create a new spirit that will neither tolerate harassment, bullying and abuse at school nor the street violence that requires police and metal detectors at school doors.
Until Rev. House and Superintendent Ely rally a core of outraged students and parents to rid the area of violence, there are no tactics, plans and skills that will help them. I’d expect Rev. House to know how rituals for painful grieving can transform the hearts of his parishioners into wisdom and determined action. Only after they have united resolutely to clean up the school and the neighborhood, will expert tactical advice and guidance be productive.
Resource Cited: http://www.examiner.com/x-949-NY-Schools-Examiner~y2009m4d8-New-York-high-school-suicide-cluster-in-Schenectady
Ben Leichtling, Ph.D. is author of the books and CDs “How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks,” “Parenting Bully-Proof Kids” and “Eliminate the High cost of Low Attitudes.” He is available for coaching, consulting and speaking. To find practical, real-world tactics to stop bullies and bullying at home, school, work and in relationships, see his web site (http://www.BulliesBeGone.com) and blog (http://www.BulliesBeGoneBlog.com).
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5 users commented in " Community Healing After School Bullying, Abuse and Suicides "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackI wonder if the school had had any ’suicide prevention’ or ‘death education’ classes before the suicides.
My daughter was bullied by two boys last year in Kindergarten. KINDERGARTEN! You want to know the measures they went through to stop it from continuing? Hmmm, they only told me about the bullying almost at the end of the school year and then when I tried to intervene they told me that I was not allowed to know the boy’s last names nor their parent’s names. So I had asked that the boys be removed from her class including art, PE, music and the others. They didn’t do that, they took my daughter out of HER class. I went immediately to the principal and stated that there will be a letter in her file from now on stating that those boys will NOT be placed in any of her classes as long as she attends school there and if I find out that they even speak to my daughter again, I would be calling the police and making them aware of the situation. She assured me that the boys would not be near my daughter this year. GUESS WHAT??? Both of them were in her music and art classes this year, I called the police and it was then taken care of. My child is in their care for 8 hours a day, they need to be protected. And if this is happenening in Kindergarten and they are gettin away with it, what do they think is going to happen in the years to come? Those boys weren’t disciplined by the school, they were “thinking” of expelling them. This irritates me. The school officials told me the same thing, “I am not there with those boys at their homes, they are learning it from somewhere.” Ugh! But don’t let me know the parent’s names. “It’s against our policy.” My daughter had a good year this year, but I just know come next year I’ll be dealing with it again.
How can someone who ‘bullies’ as a way of doing business, along with other SCSD administration, govern an entire school district without the empathy so deserving of the situation? Not to mention the students may not have parental involvement or role models. That quote is reserved for discipline problems and low test score responses (for those ‘role models’ on the top of the food chain - that didn’t grow up here, or intend to stay once they have padded their pensions.
Hi Karen,
Sorry, but your experience is typical with principals who won’t deal with bullies.
Notice, you got some results when you pushed on one of the three greatest fears of uncaring, lazy or cowardly principals – fear of publicity.
Now you have to push harder. Make sure there’s a public record. Organize a core group of active parents. Most likely, your daughter was not the only child bullied by those two boys and by other bullies.
See the chapter on school administrators in “Parenting Bully-Proof Kids.”
Best wishes,
Ben
10-9-09
Hi Previous Employee,
Unfortunately, bullies exist everywhere – always have and always will.
Our task, often difficult, is to expose them and stop them. That takes organization, publicity and laws we can fall back on. Tactics must be designed for each specific situation, but we can be successful.
Good luck,
Ben
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