Reducing Bullying Through Leadership Skills Development

The heart wrenching and disturbing statistics regarding bullying in the schools is a reason for concern. Looking at a popular definition of bullying: aggressive intentional behavior involving an imbalance of power or strength (Stop Bullying.gov), one can see a lack of caring and compassion for others. The 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development (Lerner, et al., 2008) indicates the 4-H Youth Development Program is successfully guiding youth onto the best trajectory for positive youth development. As a result of the Lerner PYD study, one rural school in Oregon invited an Extension 4-H Educator to teach leadership skills to children in grades 4-8. The goal of the training was to increase caring and compassion through interactive, teambuilding activities thereby reducing bullying. Evaluation results indicated a significant impact by the program on youth defining their ability to positively work with others.


Introduction
Bullying in the schools is a significant problem for youth.The statistics are disturbing and heart wrenching.The National Youth Safety Center (NSSC) called bullying the most enduring and underrated problem in American Schools (Beale, 2001).The 2009 National Youth Risk Behavior Survey completed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service found 1 in 5 teens had been bullied at school in the last year.Research indicates students who are chronically bullied are more likely to report physical and mental health problems, are at risk for behavioral and academic problems, and are more likely to contemplate suicide (Espelage & Swearer, 2003;Rigby, 2001).
Among the most important changes in the field over the past 25 years are shifts in emphasis toward prevention as well as remediation of problem behaviors (Horner, et al., 2004 Caring.Positive youth development programming strives to incorporate opportunities for youth to further develop these qualities.Studies on the topic of leadership education reflect an increase in learning how to care about others.A multi-site study in Oregon (Arnold, 2003) shows an increase in the mean scores of youth measures following educational retreats that focused on leadership development.Another study states: "The personal characteristic of kindness and helpfulness was desired most by both lower and higher socioeconomic status groups" (Apps, 1968).Leadership education sessions, with character-building education, may contribute to a decrease in bullying behavior.

Program Purpose
Studies indicate the importance of providing students with the tools to reduce bullying behaviors by blending positive support with explicit instruction (Ross, Horner, & Stiller, 2008).Increased bullying behavior in schools has many state legislators considering laws that will directly influence the development of school-based violence prevention policies and require these policies to be inclusive of bullying behavior.(Limber & Small, 2003).
Researchers agree that school-wide primary prevention programs are the best defense against school bullying (Elinoff, Chafouleas, & Sassu, 2004).According to Meyer and Nastasi (1999) primary prevention strategies are those that are given to an entire population and are designed to prevent a problem from occurring before signs appear.Primary prevention of bullying in schools needs to involve all students, not just those actively affected by bullying behavior.

Program Design
Based on concerns as addressed in the prior section, a School Leadership Training was designed as a Bully Prevention Program conducted at a small rural school in Oregon.Bullying behavior in the school resulted in School Administrators partnering with the local Extension 4-H Youth Educators to provide the prevention program for youth in grades 4-8.The program included a series of ten leadership education sessions, each 55 minute in length, and presented to individual classrooms of 4 th -8 th grade students.All students in these grades received the training.
The lessons and interactive activities used in the trainings were chosen to focus on understanding and appreciation of others and working together as a team.The program consisted of sessions each day for one week followed by once a month class sessions.

Daily Themes Included:
• Embrace Our Uniqueness

Evaluation
The program evaluation consisted of a pre-post, post survey containing fourteen questions designed to measure the student's attitude change toward their classmates.Twenty three 6 th graders, twenty-four 5 th graders and thirteen 7 th grade students responded to the evaluation.Of the 60 participants 35 were male and 25 were female.The evaluation tool was given to the students on the last day of the training series.T-test comparisons of the scores were statistically significant to .01 on all questions.Rating code: 5 = strongly agree; 1 = strongly disagree ªDifferences between pre-test and post-test scores is statistically significant at p<.001.
The results of the survey indicate students developed an overall awareness of how their words and actions affect others and indicate a move toward being more accepting, appreciative and caring of all classmates.The move toward caring about others and how their words and actions affect their peers theoretically should reduce intentional, aggressive, bullying behavior.
Follow up informal questioning between the educator and this school's teachers and administrators point toward a decrease in the more minor aggressive behavior displayed between students.The student's instructors noticed a marked decrease in the "picking on each other" that was frequent behavior between students.They have contributed this change to the leadership trainings.The school administrators also indicated they have noticed a drop in intentional aggressive behavior between students.

Implications
The positive impact the 4-H School Leadership Training has had on the participating students is encouraging; however more can and should be done to reduce bullying behavior in schools.The educator has been invited back for a third year of leadership training.This time, the training will be offered to students in grades 2 and 3 as well.Discussions with the teachers have shown a need to start the focus on appreciation of other earlier in a student's life.
). Lerner's study of positive youth development (2008) acknowledges the accomplishments of the 4-H Youth Development Program in its ability to help youth obtain the best development trajectory for becoming compassionate adults.The Positive Youth Development approach builds upon what have become known as the Five Cs: Competence, Confidence, Connection, Character and

Table 1
Pre-post Post Surveys: Ranking in score improvement on topics taught during Leadership Skills training