{"id":8218,"date":"2014-09-24T13:23:17","date_gmt":"2014-09-24T17:23:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=8218"},"modified":"2014-10-01T13:29:37","modified_gmt":"2014-10-01T17:29:37","slug":"york-region-students-say-yeswewill-to-halting-cyberbullying","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/york-region-students-say-yeswewill-to-halting-cyberbullying\/","title":{"rendered":"York Region students say #yeswewill to halting cyberbullying"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Over 300 students from across York Region will descend on Aurora this Monday to say they have had enough of cyberbullying and they\u2019re not going to take it anymore. <\/p>\n

The York Region District School Board and York Catholic District School Board are joining forces for the launch of #yeswewill, a hashtag that will bring awareness of cyberbullying right into the heart of the problem. The campaign kicks off Monday morning at Aurora High School and will be the first in a series of events designed to raise awareness of cyberbullying, decrease the number of incidents faced by students, and to form a network to \u201cchange the culture\u201d of cyberbullying.<\/p>\n

According to Allan Hoyle, Superintendent of Schools (Operations) for the York Region District School Board (YRDSB), the #yeswewill campaign stems out of research that suggests traditional bullying, \u201cthe one-on-one stuff,\u201d has actually \u201cplateaued\u201d in terms of the number of incidents. That does not mean, however, that students are having things any easier.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere the growth of bullying has been certainly over the last three years has been in the cybersphere,\u201d says Mr. Hoyle. \u201cWe know from our own work with children here in the Board that this is an issue here in schools and we felt it was something that needed to be addressed in a very concerted way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both the YRDSB and the YCDSB have worked diligently to put this response together. \u201cThey are all our kids\u201d, says Mr. Hoyle of the collaboration, and it is important for both boards to move together in the same direction, along with partners from the York Regional Police (YRP). <\/p>\n

\u201cWe are all aware of tragedies that have occurred across the country, and the names of children like Rahteah Parsons, Jamie Hubley, and Amanda Todd, and recognizing cyber bullying is on the rise, children have access to technology much more than they did in the past,\u201d he says. \u201cI know that sounds like a truism, but it is a truism, and we felt this was something we needed to focus on.\u201d<\/p>\n

In addition to the YRP, the Boards also worked with the Bully Free Community Alliance of York Region to develop their plan of action. While Monday\u2019s event will launch the hashtag in style, the campaign doesn\u2019t end there. Ongoing work and resources will be provided to help support students, parents, and school staff moving forward. But, for many in the school board \u2013 and indeed the home \u2013 tackling cyberbullying might be uncharted territory.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is critical that if we\u2019re going to make a difference, you have to do it at the level of students,\u201d says Hoyle. \u201cA student voice, student leadership and student participation are absolutely critical and the answer to what we need in this particular sphere as much as it is anywhere. To use another old phrase, they are digital natives. They understand this technology, or at least how to use it. We certainly had support from students in terms of that.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is perhaps difficult for us as adults when we aren\u2019t as well-versed with it. Some people are very well-versed in it, but students live in it. We have to do whatever we can to help them understand the appropriate ways to deal with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the course of the campaign, the Boards will be monitoring the hashtag as it spreads within schools, with an emphasis on secondary schools, the number of hits it receives, and the campaign will evolve from there.<\/p>\n

This is not the first time the YRDSB has delved into the world of online bullying and abuse. Two years ago they launched \u201cReport It!\u201d, an online feature which allows students to report incidents of bullying and other abuse anonymously to schools and the board itself. That too was a student-driven initiative, stemming out the Board\u2019s annual Our Voice conference, where students said they didn\u2019t feel they had a way to report bullying and not put themselves out there.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over 300 students from across York Region will descend on Aurora this Monday to say they have had enough of cyberbullying and they\u2019re not going to take it anymore. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-28y","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-15 01:39:33","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8218"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8218\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}