My daughter has been harassed in some form for over a year now. We have been trying to educate ourselves as parents on these types of issues and are still lost in knowing what to do and how to make this problem go away not only for our daughter but for our whole family and her peer group. We have watched the movie ‘Odd Girl Out’, we have seen show where this topic is discussed, we have read books for kids, have visited many sites on ‘Bully’s’, we have contacted the sheriff’s office, the school and even an attorney. She attends a private Christian school. We first contacted them last year and their response pretty much was that it was not their problem and that they didn’t want to be involved. The administration that gave me that response has since been terminated and I have tried to get the school to step in again. I have gotten a better response but not one that I believe this situation deserves. The Sheriff tells us that nothing can be done by them until she is physically hurt or until sexual harassment becomes an issue. The attorney says that we can file a civil suit but we do not want these peoples money. We just want the children to be able to attend school without all of the issues that they have to deal with.
Basically the form of harassment has taken place as more of a defamation of character type of role. If you knew my child, her character is one of the most important things to her and what she places all of herself into. This has been utterly devastating to her. To try to sum some of the events that has taken place, we found out that someone has gotten access to her IM account and had been having conversations with some of her close friends, these conversations portrayed my child as a very ‘mean and cruel’ person, copies of some of these conversations along with mean and cruel letters were sent around at school, at least one letter that we know of was sent to parents of my child’s peer trying to portray her as a mean and cruel person all of the while trying to generate pity and support for another (the teachers own child). Early on my child tried to tell me that an adult/teacher was involved in doing this. At first I couldn’t believe that an adult especially a teacher would stoop to a level where they would intentionally hurt another child. When we threatened to look into identity theft charges for the AIM account usage, I received a call from this adult/teacher to confess that this was done at her home although everyone in her family was innocent of the act itself. Through out time, my child has suffered multiple forms of harassment from other students that have been rallied by this child and adult/teacher to take a side. She has lost most of those that she would have called a ‘friend’. More recently we received ‘off of the record’ information from a school counselor that it is the adult/teacher behind most of what has been happening to my child and that not only were her peers being pressured and influenced to treat my child as an out cast but her teachers were also among some other things that were being done to try and intimidate my child. I do not believe at this time that any of her teachers has treated her poorly from this as adults are much smarter than children and know better on how to handle these types of things. Some of the school staff has come forward on my child’s behalf to confirm some of this behavior. The school tells me that they have talked with this teacher and instructed her to avoid contact with my child or being in her personal space at school. My child’s self esteem is basically nothing and we have been trying to work on that with her as I do realize that she needs to make a stand on her own. I am newly pregnant and the stress of this situation can be overwhelming at times, especially when I see the damage it has done to my child. We’re dealing with very smart adult here that seems to know just what they can do to not cross certain lines. I feel like I am grasping at straws here and sometimes the only option is to have my child moved from this school and the situation which just doesn’t seem right to me as I believe in what I tell her ‘It is adults (parent and school faculty) responsibility to handle the adult involvement in this and hers and her peers to handle the child involvement in this.’ Why is it that an adult cannot physically or sexually hurt a child but there is no protection for children for the mental abuse such as this? I feel that my child has a better chance of recovering and/or recovering unaffected from a beating then what she is going through now. Is there nothing that I can do to protect my child so she is able to heal other than having her move schools and ‘run’ from the situation? Any suggestions on possible avenues that we have not taken would be a blessing.
