Roland Rogers' Wall Combats Bullying

The held a poster contest about violence and vandalism in 2007, and there was one message that stood out loud and clear: There was a bullying problem, and the students weren’t going to stand for it.

“The images were graphic,” said Roland Rogers Principal Robin L. Moore, who recalled children were drawing pictures of bullies being beat up in multiple ways. “The students were not saying anything about bullying, but this poster was graphic.”

Moore said that from the day she began as principal at the school in 2006, she wanted students to know bullying was not an option.

“My philosophy was that no students will come to school with any ill feeling,” Moore said. “They should want to come to school, and they should want to learn.”

Moore had a poster she intended to hang on the walls throughout the school, but she soon realized it wouldn’t be enough.

That was when the anti-bullying wall went up at Roland Rogers School. Every student in the school is required to sign a pledge to be “bully-free” and post the pledge on the wall.

The wall is in the main hall of the school, and the pledges are posted from September through June.

When there is a bullying situation, the offender is brought to the wall and asked if they adhered to their pledge. Moore says she believes the wall has “been very effective” when it comes to bullying in the school.

"Although I have no data to assess the effectiveness of the pledge wall, I believe that public affirmations are an effective measure," Superintendent of Schools Annette Giaquinto said via email on Tuesday.

“In 2009, the bully-busting program was introduced,” Moore said. ”There was a poster outside every home room, but it wasn’t the same. The wall is a visual.”

"While all schools use our bully-busting program and follow board policy, each school has unique ways to promote the importance of respecting each other," Giaquinto said.

Roland Rogers is a school for children in kindergarten through sixth grade. Children posted their pledges over a three-day span, beginning last Friday with kindergarten and first grade and concluding on Tuesday, Sept. 20 with fifth and sixth grades.

They also receive a sheet of paper that defines bullying as, "when anyone at anytime communicates something that hurts, scares or leaves someone out on purpose."

Before coming to Roland Rogers, Moore spent four years at the and prior to that, was an assistant principal at Egg Harbor Township High School.

She said bullying is a problem with the older children in higher grade levels because they are less likely to report incidents. Those incidents are usually reported by an anonymous source who witnessed the incident, but wasn’t directly involved.

She also echoed the school district’s position that the set forth by the state fall in line with what the school district was already doing, except that it changes the way in which bullying is reported.