Anti Bullying Week 2021
What it Antibullying Week?
This is an event was established in the U.K and is something that is held the third week in November. This week is aimed at raising awareness of bullying of children and young people in schools or anywhere and aims at highlighting ways in which we can collaborate to prevent and respond to this bullying. Bullying has been found to be one of the most serious issues that has affected children, students, and adults for many decades now. As a result, this alliance was formed to fight bullying that helps people to know what they should or can do if they are a witness to or experience bullying.
This event was coordinated in England and Wales by the Anti-Bullying alliance, which is an international organization whose main goal is to eliminate bullying from society. Each year a specific theme is tailored that targets specific issues. This year’s theme is “One Kind Word,” and this year it takes place from November 15-19. After the isolation that was faced last year, these little acts break down barriers and brighten the lives of those that are around us. Kindness has therefore been found to be more important than it has ever been before.
What is our call to action?
Research has shown that approximately 30% of children were bullied in 2020 and 17% were cyber bullied. Bullying has been found to have a significant impact on a child’s life and can and does last into adulthood. Adults who were bullied as children has been found to experience a range of mental health issues, earn less money, be obese, unable to keep steady relationships, and the list goes on.
Something as simple as saying “hey” to someone makes a difference. Ask if they are okay, say you’re sorry. In our world that is filled with negativity, this one kind act or word provides a moment of hope and can be a turning point. It changes perspective and changes our view of the world the people around us. Most importantly, this act of kindness can be contagious because kindness fuels kindness.
Getting Involved
Odd Socks Day
This is the kickoff to this year’s campaign and takes place on Monday November 15th. Fronted by Andy Day and his bad “Andy and the Odd Socks,” millions of children and even adults go to their place or work or go to school in odd socks. This aims at highlighting how unique everyone is and to help prevent bullying because of our uniqueness.
An abundance of resources and tools are created for schools including but not limited to lesson plans, films, assembly plans that are all designed revolving around Anti-Bullying week and the theme that has been developed.
Anti-Bullying week is also something that is a trend on different social media platforms. These include using hashtags on twitter, videos on you tube (that has gotten over 600,000 views), videos on tiktok. It was found that there is an 84% increase in social media engagement and the ABA website has had an abundance of visits.
It is extremely important to realize the impact that raising the awareness of bullying has on young people and helps schools tackle bullying as well as cyber bullying. It has been found through research that this event has been effective. It has been found that up to 94% of children and young people reported that this event DOES raise awareness and help bullying.
Let us try to do our part as a society this week and come together to help raise awareness of bullying. We have all been a part of the community at some point in our lives. Let’s think about how this impacted us and try to make a change for our young ones that are going to be the new future. Let us be the changes we want to see in the world! #UNITEDAGAINSTBULLYING!
