Mr. Evans Addresses Dauphin County Joint School Board Meeting

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Mr. Evans Addresses Dauphin County Joint School Board Meeting
Desiring to hear a counterpoint to the recent flood of media reports concerning bullying and school violence, Mr. Larry Evans, the Dauphin County Technical School's (DCTS) ninth-grade facilitator, was requested to speak to the Dauphin County Joint School Board meeting held on April 11.

The coordination meeting, held annually at DCTS, brings together with DCTS administrators all members of the six Dauphin County, Pennsylvania school district boards -- Central Dauphin, Derry Township, Halifax Area, Lower Dauphin, Middletown Area and Susquehanna Township -- whose students are served by DCTS's vocational-technical programs.

In his presentation to the assembled representatives, Mr. Evans expressed his sincere thanks to school board members and teachers for their invaluable contributions in making a difference with Dauphin County teens. Evans went on to express gratitude to board members and DCTS for the opportunities extended to him in providing 15 years of service to the Dauphin County School system through the DCTS ninth-grade Exploratory Program. Mr. Evans then presented a picture of the DCTS Personal and Social Responsibility program for students, the Affective Skills Parent Seminar and the value to other schools of teaching the affective skills curriculums utilized in these programs.

His overview of the curriculums focused on the four affective skills -- Respect, Responsibility, Relating Effectively, and Problem-Solving and Goal-Setting -- which are addressed and enhanced with students and parents who attend the DCTS classes. Said Evans, "The essential hard skills of academics and vocational competencies are extremely important, but each year 9 out of 10 people are fired from their job because of poor interpersonal and social skills."

These four affective skills were shown to relate directly to every issue of personal or social concern, the current one being bullying. Through articles and examples, Mr. Evans illustrated that security plans and protective measures put into practice, even at those schools affected by shootings and other acts of bullying by students, have not been fully effective by themselves in preventing further attacks.

To the question posed in one article, "Is there anything that they [schools] can do to prevent campus violence?" Mr. Evans provided a resounding Yes. The answer, he said, lies in the teaching and practice of these four affective skills as he related them below:

RESPECT (for self and others) - We can only respect others to the degree we respect ourselves. Bullies have low self-esteem and respect. They have not been respected sufficiently and are essentially giving back what they've gotten.

RESPONSIBILITY ("for" self and "to" others) - Everything except death is a "choice." We don't "have to" do anything except die, but our choices have resultant "consequences," both positive and negative. No one can "make" us mad if we are in control of ourselves.

A bully may "invite" us to be mad, but we then "choose" to accept or reject the invitation.

RELATING EFFECTIVELY - This goes beyond basic listening skills, it's being able to have productive "discussions" with others. If we want to "invite" the bullies to change we must use appropriate eye-contact, body posture and reflective listening.

SOLVING PROBLEMS and SETTING GOALS:

Problem Solving - being able to solve our problems and helping others solve theirs. 85% of people (including bullies) do not need professional help. They need to learn these basic skills plus have at least one caring person in their life with these same skills.

Goal Setting - developing a "vision" and "purpose" for our lives. It's been said that we can live, "four weeks without food, four days without water and four minutes without air, but only four seconds without hope." This curriculum includes activities to invite a person to focus, sharpen their vision and so, find "hope."

Mr. Evans offered board members three additional suggestions regarding bullies:

While security and protective measures should be practiced at schools to protect the innocent from bullies, we need also to find effective ways to deal with the bullies themselves. Simply comforting the offended can often do more than publicly punishing the offender toward allowing a bully to "convict himself" and making him open to later handling of the incident in private.

Concentrate on the "behavior" not the "person." In other words, focus on what a child does, but also who he is. When we "attack" the person it only "feeds" the behavior. Some teenagers, deprived of love at home, actually get a "high" from being yelled at and kicked out of class.

We must see the hypocrisy in "bullying" a bully. Each of us, when we allow ourselves to disrepect others -- our spouses, our children, or our students -- too often become the bullies, even to those we teach and love.

The session ended with video tapes and recordings of recent activities by Parent Seminar graduates to bring local public and news media attention to the efforts by Dauphin County Technical School in successfully teaching affective skills to students and their parents.

-- John Borland --

Click Here to view Larry's full speech to the Dauphin County Joint School Board Meeting

Affective Skills Web Site

Last Modified: March 30, 2003