I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
Bernalillo County — and Albuquerque more specifically — has reaffirmed its commitment to help students who are victims of bullying following Buffalo, N.Y., native Jamey Rodemeyer’s suicide after years of suffering taunts from peers based on his sexuality.
In attempting to tackle the threat of bullying, the county has a zero tolerance law on the books in public parks, encouraging locals to dial or text an incident of bullying. Bernalillo County Parks and Recreation, which oversees the hotline, also just wrapped up a film competition that encouraged children to submit documentaries outlining the perils of bullying. The Public Service Announcements will be aired September 29 at the Wool Warehouse, where prizes will be awarded to finalists and the top PSA will air on New Mexico’s CW and My50 TV.
Gov. Susana Martinez in April signed into law SB78 that holds schools accountable for bullying and instructed all campuses to have an anti-bullying measure in place by August 2012.
Albuquerque has one third of all New Mexico households with a person under the age of 18, and is recognized as one of the country’s fastest growing cities. Its rapid development and the state’s relatively low unemployment rate means many new families have settled into the region, bringing with them more school-aged children.
Some anti-bullying measures are codified on a federal level. In October of last year, the Office of Civil Rights within the U.S. Department of Education sent out a letter to local officials reminding them discriminatory bullying violates several landmark civil rights laws.
From the letter:
The statutes that OCR enforces include Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 19641(Title VI), which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin; Title IX of the Education Amendments of 19722 (Title IX), which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex; Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 19733(Section 504); and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 19904 (Title II). Section 504 and Title II prohibit discrimination on the basis of disability.5 School districts may violate these civil rights statutes and the Department’s implementing regulations when peer harassment based on race, color, national origin, sex, or disability is sufficiently serious that it creates a hostile environment and such harassment is encouraged, tolerated, not adequately addressed, or ignored by school employees.
But a large population does not increase the likelihood of bullying, necessarily. A study conducted at the Curry School of Education in Virginia conducted interviews and examined case logs from 294 schools confirmed that while the number of bullying incidents is higher in large schools, the frequency is not dependent on school size.
According to the briefing paper, socio-economics plays a greater role:
Factors such as student body poverty and minority composition had a small positive association with victimization rates, but contrary to popular perception, urban location was negatively correlated with assault. Although these other school demographics generated significant statistical effects, school size did not matter
Still, the federal government, through the partnership of the Department of Justice, Dept. of Education and Dept. of Health and Human Services, created the Safe Schools/Safe Students Initiative, which provides grants to communities combating bullying and other incidents of youth-related violence. Six school districts and local authorities in New Mexico have received funding from the program since 1999, when dollars for the grants were first authorized. While Albuquerque received grants, smaller cities like Rio Rancho have also benefited from the youth-safety initiative.
On Wednesday, U.S. Dept. of Education Sec. Arne Duncan told an audience attending the second annual summit on bullying he hopes the re-authorization of the Early and Secondary Education Act, now known as No Child Left Behind, will include explicit language on bullying prevention.
