中加国际学校互爱互敬活动周反欺凌和网络暴力

    Anna Zhao

    anna.whizh@yahoo.com

    Students wearing pink shirts and pink hand straps are holding hands as they stand in a big circle — but this is not a festival or some kind of celebration for a special occasion. It is the annual Bullying Awareness Week, a campaign that originated in Canada.

    Shenzhen Concord College of Sino Canada and the International School of Nanshan (SCCSC/ISNS) held the event from March 18 to 22 to raise people’s awareness of bullying. The theme this year was “Born this way,” and the activities included a variety of programs such as training lessons, an Internet campaign and team-building games, with the aim of promoting respect and friendship among students.

    The campaign was initiated last year by Amy Rankin, director of personal development of SCCSC/ISNS. “Most people think bullying is an individual problem. If I educate a small group of people, then they would spread the positive energy to more people, just like teaching someone to fish,” said Rankin.

    Greg Smith, a teacher at the school, said bullying awareness was not a topic that was frequently discussed in China and the event brought the problem to the forefront. “Bullying may happen on campus but the kids don’t talk about it,” said Smith. He added that there are different ways of bullying, including neglect and being ignored in classroom.

    While most people think of bullying as a physical fight, there are indeed many types of bullying that are equally harmful, such as cyber bullying — using social media to talk negatively about another person.

    Cyber bullying was a topic that achieved much attention this year because students have easy access to the Internet and social media with their mobile phones.

    The school principal, Sun Yanqiu, said that one of the goals of the event was to promote mutual respect and good manners among students.

    Many students said they found the event very useful. Zheng Hong and Chen Bochen, who are peer counselors, said they were shocked to learn the story of a Senior 2 student who was abused in online videos showing him doing poorly in a PE exam, and Chen said that he thought good relations with other students and improved communication could prevent bullying.

    Students were also asked to write essays about their experience of social media and cyber bullying. Kou Jianhua, who teaches Chinese in the school, said that the event was meaningful because the essays showed it had raised awareness of the issue.