The Bellmawr Board of Education firmly believes that all of its students are entitled to an educational environment conducive to learning and free of harassment. Students should have the opportunity to enjoy coming to school and they must look forward to learning in each of our schools.

The board realizes that a part of growing, maturing, and developing into a productive citizen requires learning the necessary social skills to be successful in our diverse society. In order to ensure that our students are successful, the board will not accept harassment of students by other students and promulgates this policy to ensure that everyone is working toward an environment devoid of harassment.

All incident reports of harassment will be fully investigated and appropriate action will be taken.

1. Verbal or Physical Intimidation- to hurt by treating wrongly, injury; to attack with coarse or insulting language.

Examples of verbal intimidation include name calling, teasing, stating untrue or disparaging stories, screaming, demanding or threatening.

Examples of physical intimidation include punching, hitting, pushing, slapping, prohibiting someone to walk to their destination, crowding around a student or group of students with the purpose to intimidate, ethnic slurs, racial slurs, etc.

2. Bullying- as with aggressive behavior generally, bullying intentionally causes hurt to the recipient. This hurt can be both physical or psychological; while some bullying takes the form of hitting, pushing, taking money, it can also involve telling nasty stories, teasing, and social exclusion. It can be carried out by one or a group. Three criteria particularly distinguish bullying: unprovoked, repeated action, and perceived intimidation by a stronger person.

Examples of bullying include taking money, making an individual walk a route to avoid confrontation, physical abuse, verbal abuse, threatening looks or insulting stories.

3. Sexual Harassment- unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of sexual nature constitutes sexual harassment.

Examples of sexual harassment include unwelcome jokes, touching, verbal comments about parts of a person’s body, clothing, and looks, spreading sexual rumors, suggestive gestures, pressure for sexual activity, malicious activities such as pulling down a person’s pants, or clothing.

4. Any behavior which creates the perception or actually causes a hostile environment for others.

Any student who believes they are a victim of harassment by another student should report the alleged acts or circumstances to their teacher, school counselor, or administrator. A conference will be scheduled to address the situation and proper course of action will be taken. This conference may include parental involvement at the discretion of the administrator. The administrator will implement an appropriate remediation plan.

In an effort to minimize harassment from occurring, the district’s health, guidance, family life curriculums as well as acceptable behavior standards will stress positive social behavior among all our students.