Kentucky
antibullying proposal gains wider support

Kentucky state education organizations, mental health and social work professionals, parents, and conservative groups are all backing an antibullying proposal this year, giving supporters hope that such a measure could become law. Kentucky has no law to address school bullying, and attempts to pass one have failed in the past two legislative sessions. But a proposal in the house received unanimous support Wednesday from the house education committee. "It's never had the broad-based support it has this year," said the Reverend Pat Delahanty, associate director of the Catholic Conference of Kentucky. Allan Beane, a former Murray State University professor, knows the effects of bullying from personal experience. "It destroyed our son.... Kids were just really cruel to him," said Beane, whose son, Curtis, after years of being bullied at school, became depressed, started taking drugs, and eventually died at age 23. The house bill, whose lead sponsor is Democratic state representative Mike Cherry, would require all districts and schools to have policies and procedures for dealing with harassment, intimidation, or bullying of a student. Schools also would be required to report to the state incidents in which a student has been disciplined three times for bullying in a semester or in which a student has been the target of three bullying incidents in a semester. An amendment would require school councils to let parents review and give input on bullying policies and curricula. Democratic senator Julian Carroll also has filed a bill on bullying, which has been referred to the senate education committee. More than 170 of the state's 176 school districts have antibullying policies, according to the Kentucky School Boards Association, a ratio that is comparable to that of most other states, although only 17 states have bullying laws. Those facts raise questions about whether legislation is necessary, said Ken Trump, a national school security consultant based in Ohio. "The problem is that most of this type of legislation has little to no resources for schools to do anything other than having an unnecessary and unfunded mandate that's really questionable whether or not it's needed," Trump said. But Cherry and Beane, who works as a school-bullying consultant, say most schools and districts don't have comprehensive schoolwide programs that educate teachers, students, and parents on the issue. Data collected by the Kentucky Center for Safe Schools has found that about 20% to 25% of students in Kentucky schools report being bullied. "This [legislation] provides them the framework, the guidance, and the urge, or the nudge, to do" something about bullying, Cherry said. Concerns have been raised in the past that bullying legislation could infringe on students' freedom of speech or give special protections to certain groups. That was the case with an earlier version of the bill that prohibited bullying for any reason, including sexual orientation. The latest version of the bills does not contain the sexual-orientation wording, which was important to the Family Foundation. "We want all children protected equally, and that's what this bill does that the previous one didn't do," said Martin Cochrane, a policy analyst for the foundation. (AP)