In the popular 1930s cartoon 'Popeye the Sailor Man,' Popeye — a short, thin man with one eye, oversized forearms and a propensity for spinach — was often teased, harassed, bullied and beaten up by a large, bearded man named Bluto.
TUSCALOOSA | In the popular 1930s cartoon 'Popeye the Sailor Man,' Popeye — a short, thin man with one eye, oversized forearms and a propensity for spinach — was often teased, harassed, bullied and beaten up by a large, bearded man named Bluto.
Bluto would harass Popeye, calling him names like 'one-eyed runt' and beat him up before kidnapping Popeye's girlfriend, Olive Oyl.
If Bluto and Popeye were students today, Bluto would likely find himself in much bigger trouble than just taking an uppercut to the chin by Popeye.
Bullying and harassment have become hot-button issues for educators in the past few years.
Cyberbullying in particular — bullying through the use of the Internet or a cellphone — has become a serious problem nationwide, leading some students to attempt or commit suicide.
'Bullying in today's society has taken on a whole new meaning than what we've known previously,' said Vickie Brown, director of student services for the Tuscaloosa City School System. 'With cyberbullying you can bully a person and not be face-to-face with them.'
Brown said the Tuscaloosa City School System has had to deal with several incidents of cyberbullying since January.
'In general, what we're finding is on Facebook, bullying starts after school hours at home,' Brown said. 'The next day at school (the students) will see each other and the conflict will manifest. They may fight, which turns into a different incident.'
With heightened awareness of bullying and harassment, school officials are seeking new ways to combat it.
The Tuscaloosa City School System is conducting awareness training starting this week.
Training forums titled 'The Latest Trends and Signs of Bullying,' will be held Thursday at Northridge High School, April 18 at Paul W. Bryant High School and April 25 at Central High School.
The training will be from 6-7:30 p.m. on each of those dates, for students, parents and members of the community who are interested in the issue.
Brown said the bullying forum will educate parents about what the school system is doing to prevent bullying and what they can do to help.
'Because of bullying and all the areas of technology now, it was just an area that we had to address,' Brown said. 'We do plan on this being an ongoing forum for discussions and providing information.
'Being proactive and preventive is what we want to do in bullying and recognizing the signs early before it becomes a major issue in our schools.'
On March 10, President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama held a national conference on bullying at the White House.
At the conference, Obama said that about 13 million students are bullied annually. Experts say that being bullied puts students at greater risk of failing school, abusing drugs or alcohol, or suffering mental and health problems.
Students who are seen as different because of their race, clothes, disability or sexual orientation are more likely to be bullied, but bullying isn't something that people have to accept as a rite of passage.
Janaisha Wells, a 13-year-old seventh-grader at University Place Middle School, says she knows well what it's like to be bullied.
For nearly a year, Janaisha said she was bullied by an older student while at Southview Middle School.
In sixth grade, Janaisha was picked on and harassed by another female student on the bus, in the hallways at school and even at home.
'My daughter was home by herself after school watching TV when she heard a knocking on the door,' said Shernay Wells, Janaisha's mother. 'She looked out the window and it was the girl and another girl.'
'She opened the door and the girl said, ‘I'm gonna beat your ass,' ' Wells said. 'She asked the girl why and the girl said that Janaisha had lied on her. She asked about what. The girl didn't answer her.'
Janaisha ended up going to a neighbor's house and told her what was going on. The neighbor threatened to call the police on one girl who was harassing Janaisha. But the girl continued to harass Janaisha well into the next school year.
Janaisha said she reported the harassment to school officials several times, but the harassment continued for months until the girls got into a fight at school.
The other girl was eventually suspended from school. She now attends a school in a different county.
But Janaisha also faced consequences for fighting. She was suspended from school and was sent to alternative school for two weeks, Wells said.
After a student hearing with the school board, Janaisha was allowed to return to school, but her mother decided to transfer her to University Place instead.
'I transferred her because after all that she had been through, she had to have counseling,' Wells said. 'She didn't want to go to school and started having headaches and getting nausea. Her counselor said that she was suffering from anxiety attacks because of the bullying, so I transferred her to University Place.'
The Tuscaloosa City School System declined to comment on the incident.
On Oct. 1, 2009, the Student Harassment Prevention Act went into effect in Alabama.
It requires that all public school systems in the state adopt policies to prevent students from being bullied, which the act defines as being harassed, intimidated, threatened or hurt in an act of violence by another student.
The Tuscaloosa County Board of Education approved the system's new anti-harassment policy during its June 7 board meeting. The policy defines behavior that's expected of students — respect, courteousness, abiding by the law — and also types of bullying such as sexual and nonsexual harassment, intimidation and violence, that are unacceptable.
In compliance with the act, the Tuscaloosa City School System also updated its anti-harassment policy to include cyberbullying and adopted a new anti-bullying policy that went into effect in January.
'All bullying and harassment cases are now documented, which is required by law now since the Student Harassment and Prevention Act was passed,' Brown said.
The city schools' new anti- bullying policy was ground-breaking. It was the first anti-bullying policy in the state to expand a school system's jurisdiction over students to any location on or off school property when a student interferes with another student's educational opportunities or substantially disrupts the operations of a school or school-sponsored activity.
City schools attorney Dave Ryan said in September that the new policy allows the system's anti-bullying policy to be more thoroughly enforced.
The new policy, as well as the system's updated procedures for handling bullying, will be discussed at the forums.
'We want to produce a safe environment that's conducive to learning,' Brown said. 'That's our goal.'