Opinion: To Combat Bullying, Schools Must Emphasize Kindness, Respect and Character

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If your child were sick and there might be a cure, wouldn’t you want to try it? It may be flu season, but there is another contagion lurking in our schools’ halls. While this illness has no vaccine, injecting kindness back into schools may offer protection and even save lives. Bullying is among the most damaging issues affecting students today, and in some cases even taking lives.

There has been considerable debate in schools and among policymakers on how best to ensure American students are keeping pace academically. Research shows the COVID-19 pandemic and school shutdowns had a significant negative impact on students’ learning.

This debate over academic proficiency, while well-intentioned, is ultimately failing our children. It completely overlooks that American students are falling behind on a much-more important developmental goal: moral proficiency.

The failure to emphasize kindness, respect and character in our schools is encouraging other behaviors to fill that void. An epidemic of bullying pervades classrooms and affects students across the country. The numbers tell the story: According to a Pew Research Center study released last year, nearly 60% of teens identify bullying as commonplace in their schools. One in five say it’s extremely common, and among teens it was cited as the second biggest problem affecting students today. Previous studies have found that two in five students say they were bullied on school property, and nearly half reported being victims of cyberbullying.

Three years ago, we lost our 17-year-old son to bullying. We sent a healthy, happy 16-year-old boy to a new school excited to make friends. He was kind to everyone, a leader, and wanted a life in public service. This made him a target. His reputation was destroyed by lies spread in person and online over the course of a year, beginning with a school election. While he stood up for himself until his final breath, he suffered in plain sight and died by suicide — unnecessarily, avoidably and alone.

After his death, we learned that many schools, including our son’s, have no legal obligation to protect your child from bullying. We became advocates for change. No child should have to endure the same cruelty, anguish and pain as Jack did. 

This campaign for change took an important step forward in October when New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed the Jack Reid Law to combat bullying in schools and extend protections already afforded to public school students to those in the state’s independent schools. A diverse coalition of caring legislators and faith-based and independent school leaders worked with us to pass the law, giving half a million private school students in New York the most basic human right: to feel safe. The law ensures that when a child comes forward or bullying is witnessed, the school is obligated to act promptly: investigate, communicate and respond. 

But these policy changes are a solution to an epidemic that needs a bigger fix than new laws. We know the cure. Bullying is like an insidious disease that grows unchecked in cultures where character and kindness are not cherished.

The chief mission of our schools must be teaching skills and values for life, not just improving test outcomes. That means respect for others and their differences. It means civility; not just reading the student handbook but living it. And it means calling out — and addressing — behaviors and actions that threaten the school climate for everyone. 

Bullying cannot be viewed as acceptable or endurable behavior. The old adages that it will “toughen them up” or “is part of growing up” are archaic and misguided. The bullying our kids experience today is not simple playground teasing — our children do not feel safe in school anymore, and because of social media, that fear follows them home. Ask yourself: How can you learn algebra in the classroom if you are afraid of what could happen in the hallway?

Only seven states have protections in place for every child. This is unacceptable. We need to help the remaining four million private and parochial school students at risk. Anti-bullying mandates actually reaffirm the mission of our schools: teach the whole child. We hope the Jack Reid Law is a wake-up call. Laws are meaningless symbols if not lived. Climate and culture matter. It must start with school leaders and flow through the entire system of the school: from the chemistry teacher to the gym coach and to each child.

Kindness and bullying are both contagious. One is free; the other cost us our entire fortune — our beloved son. Which one do you want in your school?

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