The NJ legislature has passed the nation's strongest anti-bullying bill of rights for students. The bill now goes to the Governor for his signature.
Bullied students are up to nine times more likely to have suicidal thoughts than non-bullied students, according to a 2008 Yale Medical School report. 32 percent of students 12 through 18 are bullied each year, according to a 2009 CDC report. The percentage of students bullied in New Jersey is one percent higher than the national average, according to a 2009 report by the U.S. Departments of Justice and Education.
Though New Jersey and 44 other states already have anti-bullying laws, experts say those laws largely follow a common model that lacks sufficient statewide standards to counter bullying in the real world. The "Anti Bullying Bill of Rights" corrects that problem with a sweeping overhaul of New Jersey's current anti-bullying law, enacted in 2002.
The Anti-Bullying Bill of Rights applies to schools from kindergarten through 12th grade, strengthens New Jersey's cyberbullying law, applies to bullying off school grounds that carries into schools, and has a section that applies to the state's public universities.
The Anti-Bullying Bill of Rights protects all students bullied for any reason. The legislation maintains the language of New Jersey's existing anti-bullying law, enacted in 2002, which enumerates protection of students based on their actual or perceived race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, disability, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, and has clear language protecting students bullied for any other reason. The law will continue to apply to students bullied for any reason.
The Anti-Bullying Bill of Rights is so comprehensive, we highlight just a few of the provisions here. The legislation is the first in the US to:
Set firm statewide deadlines for incidents of bullying to be reported, investigated and resolved. Teachers and other school personnel will have to report incidents of bullying to principals on the same day as a bullying incident. An investigation of the bullying must begin within one school day. A school will have to complete its investigation of bullying within 10 school days, after which there must be a resolution of the situation.
Create a anti-bullying team at each school led by a designated anti-bullying specialist. Also serving on a school's anti-bullying team will be the principal, a teacher and a parent, and others appointed by the principal.
Grade every school on how well it is countering bullying – and requires that every school post its grade on the home page of its website. Every school will also be required to post on the home page of its website the contact information for the school's anti-bullying specialist.
Involve a cross-section of experts from academia and the not-for-profit sector in promulgating anti-bullying training of school personnel, ensuring that such training is state-of-the-art and kept updated.
Encompass bullying at public universities, which must create anti-bullying rules and procedures, and distribute them to every university student within seven days of the start of the fall semester.
The legislation also requires a school to notify the parents of all students involved in an incident, including the parents of the bully and the bullied student, and shall offer counseling and intervention services; incorporates instruction appropriate to each grade to counter bullying, and creates an annual school-wide Week of Respect during which each school will provide anti-bullying programming; and strengthens suicide prevention training for teachers, to include information on reducing the occurrence of suicide among bullied students.
