My high school (rather than showing bullying in a negative way) encourages kids to be kind to others. This was a breathe of fresh air freshman year. And it worked. I didn’t experience bullying.

Unfortunately, there was one instance of bullying. Yik Yak was the most famous example. Yik Yak is an app in which people can post anonymously for people in a five mile radius can see. Students used this to spread rumors about other students. This issue was solved within one or two days--the developers of the app allowed my school to put a “GeoFence” around the school so even when not connected to the school WiFi it was blocked.

After the incident, my school went further and used NoH8 Week to promote good relations with others. During NoH8 Week students were asked to wear different colored clothes each day to represent the different ways hate can hurt. On all the lockers students found sticky notes with nice notes put there by most of the clubs. As someone who had never experienced bullying first hand, this seemed repetitive.

Mr. Bolt, our school psychologist, compared it to the anti drug movement of the 80’s and 90’s. Everyone had heard about it everyone knew about it but the change was slow. My school tries to go beyond just the regular speeches and videos showing the effects of bullying. Things like being positive and respectful and sports teams doing public services. Most teams participate in wings, a freshman orientation program that is used to show freshman that bullying is not tolerated and that school should be a positive experience.

Based on what I’ve heard about other schools, my school does well at keeping bullying to a minimum. The fact that I don’t have personal experience with bullying proves this. My school and it’s positive reinforcement successfully prevents bullying and makes me proud to be a Warhawk.