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Anti-Bullying Policy

 

ANTI-BULLYING POLICY

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

Merchant Taylors' Girls' School aims to provide a safe and caring environment in which each of its pupils feels secure; an environment where pupils can express themselves freely, form relationships and learn at their own pace.
We see it as the responsibility of the Governors, all staff, whether teaching or support, as well as parents to ensure that our school has an ethos which encourages pupils to achieve their maximum potential both academically and socially.
In addition, all staff will be aware of and take into consideration the different needs of pupils challenged by issues such as visual or auditory impairment, mobility, mental health, dyslexia.


DEFINITIONS

Any behaviour which is threatening or makes an individual feel unhappy, uncomfortable or intimidated in school is clearly not acceptable.
Such behaviour may be regarded as bullying. There are many definitions of bullying, but most have 3 things in common:
It is deliberately hurtful behaviour
It is repeated often over a long period of time
It is difficult for those being bullied to defend themselves
Bullying can take many forms including:
• Emotional/Psychological
being unfriendly, excluding, tormenting (e.g. hiding books, threatening gestures)
• Physical pushing, kicking, hitting, punching or any use of violence
• Verbal name-calling, sarcasm, spreading rumours, teasing
And be in the form of:
- Racial, religious or cultural using taunts, graffiti, gestures, insulting remarks
- Sexual through unwanted physical contact or sexually abusive comments
- Homophobic focusing on the grounds of sexuality
- Disability related focusing on an individual's disability
- Cyber involving all areas of internet, such as email & internet chat room misuse, mobile threats by text messaging & calls and or misuse of associated technology , ie camera & video facilities.

EFFECTS

Victims of bullying may experience many immediate mental or physical health-related consequences and suffer from anxiety disorders and depression which can continue into adulthood. Pupils who bully others also experience many short term and long term consequences of their bullying behaviour and may also become depressed as a result of their actions.
Criminal laws: The Public Order Act 1986 made it an offence to use towards another person threatening, abusive, or insulting words or behaviour, and it is a similar offence to distribute or display anything that is threatening, abusive, or insulting. A further offence of intentionally causing harassment was introduced by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994.
We are aware that bullying is prevalent in all aspects of life not only in schools and that no school can claim with absolute confidence that ‘there is no bullying here'.
Every school has some degree of bullying, however slight or infrequent. We believe that there is not a great problem at MTGS, but we aim through policy and action to respond positively and effectively to any incidents, however trivial they may seem.

SIGNS OF BULLYING


Changes in behaviour that may indicate that a pupil is being bullied include:
• Unwillingness to return to school
• Displays of excessive anxiety, becoming withdrawn or unusually quiet
• Failure to produce work, or producing unusually bad work or work that appears to have been copied, interfered with or spoilt by others
• Books, bags, belongings go missing or are damaged
• Change to established habits (e.g. giving up extra curricular activities, changing accent/vocabulary)
• Diminished levels of self confidence
• Frequent visits to School Nurse
• Unexplained cuts/ bruises
• Absence, erratic attendance, late arrival to class
• Choosing company of adults
• Repressed body language, poor eye contact
• Difficult sleep patterns
• Talk of suicide/running away

 

GUIDELINES TO STAFF WHEN DEALING WITH BULLYING

1. Listen to the pupils
Encourage them to speak freely
Assure them that their allegations will be dealt with in confidence initially but that you will need to consult the appropriate member of staff, e.g. Head, Deputy, Heads of Upper and Lower School, Pastoral Counsellor.
Assure them that we will consult with them at all stages of the investigation
Assure them that appropriate action will be taken
Encourage them to involve their parents.
2. The appropriate member of staff should undertake a full investigation of the allegations to verify what has been going on.
3. The school will embark upon the following action, where appropriate.
i. Interview the pupils involved and get written reports.
ii. In many cases a conciliatory approach may be useful, in which the person dealing with the incident attempts to improve the situation by encouraging those involved in bullying to empathise with the victim, (see the Pastoral Staff for advice on this ‘no-blame' approach).
iii. The pupils should be seen a week later (informally) to discuss how things are going, so that they can realise that the situation is still being monitored.
iv. If the problem is more serious, it may be necessary to involve the parents and keep accurate records of how the school has responded if the family should decide to take legal action.
v. It may be appropriate to break up the group dynamics of a gang of pupils known to be bullying e.g. by keeping them in at lunchtime and break times if that is when they are a threat to others. This may also apply to a single pupil.
vi. Exclusion as a response to bullying should be used sparingly and as a last resort.
vii. Once a plan of action has been worked out and the matter dealt with it is essential to monitor progress over the following weeks and months. This may also involve supporting the victim and counselling the bully.

GUIDELINES FOR PUPILS


If you feel bullied by another person:
• Tell the person that you do not like what he/she is doing
• Never allow the bullying to carry on - it is not your fault
• Try to remain calm and clear when talking to the bully
• Always tell your Form Tutor or another teacher as soon as you can
• Tell your parent or the person who looks after you what happened
• Try to get witnesses and make a note of what, where and when it happened

If you see another person being bullied:
• Stop the bullying if you can or find an adult - a teacher or a Sixth Former
• If you see it happening out of school tell your Form Tutor or another teacher as soon as possible
• If it is happening on the school bus tell your Form Tutor or Mrs Bush


PREVENTION

PSHE lessons have an important part to play in preventing bullying.
Bullying is one of the topics listed in the PSHE programme for both Year 7, and Year 8 and each form has one period PSHE per week with their form tutor / PSHE tutor.
There are also opportunities for Year 9 and above to address bullying in their PSHE periods, by arrangement with their PSHE tutors.
The PSHE year files, PSHE library contain numerous exercises and programmes on the following: friendship, self-esteem, decision-making and assertiveness.
Assemblies address bullying issues during the year, particularly during Anti Bullying Week.
Staff Training/CPD

MONITORING


The Heads of Year record where and when bullying takes place. As part of this monitoring, the pastoral staff will review procedures and amend or take action accordingly.

 

November 2009