Should Schools Discipline Cyber Bullies?

By some accounts, every day, around 160,000 do not attend school because they are afraid of bullies. Those who are afraid and attend anyway are distracted and can't pay attention. Clearly, school administrators need to do everything possible to quell bullying and provide a safe environment for all students.

More and more, however, the type of bullying these students encounter is through social media or other cyber media rather than physical confrontations, making it impossible for victims to simply avoid the perpetrator via school intervention. School administrators are in a tough position. What if all the activity takes place outside of school hours? Where does school authority end? How can school administrators have the resources to monitor students' social media, and do so without invading privacy? By the time someone reports the abuse, the damage is often already done. It is easy to argue that schools monitoring what students do outside of school hours is an obvious overreach of power.

The only easy answer is that schools can offer educational programs and teach students smart social media use. This is, of course, only part of the equation, and students set on bullying other students often need a deterrent or discipline to quit the behavior.

I don't envy school administrators in sorting out this thorny problem. I suggest this topic for a discussion or debate in the classroom. When I used it with my class recently, the opinions and ideas were eye-opening. There was so much fodder for debate, the students couldn't wait to get writing!