Across the nation, entire industries of consultants and businesses have formed with curriculums, workshops and pep talks to combat bullying in schools. Although well-intentioned, a new “war on bullying” will have limited success for the same reason our earlier “wars” have come up short. Such “wars” lack a coordinated strategy. They focus on symptoms instead of causes and short-term interventions instead of the needs and capacities that emerge throughout the long arc of a child’s growth and development.

In fact, a thorough examination by Rachel C. Vreeman and Aaron E. Carroll in the Pediatric Adolescent Medicine Journal demonstrated only four out of 10 most widely-used anti-bullying curriculums decreased bullying (2007). While the evidence shows that much more scientific research needs to be done to develop effective ways to reduce bullying of the child with special needs, there are tools and programs that show promising results. Here are examples of programs or approaches that demonstrate success in reducing the rate of bullying against children with special needs through coordinated efforts. Which leads one to ask, what works?

Social and Emotional Learning Curriculums (SEL)
Social and emotional learning (SEL) assists children to develop fundamental skills to effectively handle school, relationships and personal development. Examples may include managing emotions, caring for others, decision making and handling situations ethically. New research provides dramatic evidence that social and emotional learning can be taught, just like geometry and Spanish.

Child Development published the most scientifically rigorous review of research ever done on social and emotional learning interventions for children aged 5-18. The review, by a team of researchers from Loyola University, the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL), synthesizes the results of more than 200 independent studies on the impact of SEL programs and represented a group of 270,034 students (2010). Read "The Benefits of School-Based Social and Emotional Learning Programs: Highlights from a Major New Report" for details on the review.

The findings showed great promise.  High-quality SEL programs led to significant improvements in students’ social and emotional skills, in attitudes about self and others, and in classroom behavior. Programs were also associated with substantial decreases in conduct problems and emotional distress such as anxiety and depression—all of which are part of the bullying phenomenon.  Academic scores also improved significantly—by as much as 11 percentile points. Educators realized that SEL doesn’t interfere with academic learning but helps it.

Your Child's Social and Emotional Development

Because social and emotional components factor into why children bully other students, the ability to teach them behavioral skills, many of which are part of SEL, can reduce the incidence of bullying – no matter if the victim is a child with special needs or neurotypical student. Vreeman and Carroll (2007) concluded in a report that the most effective anti-bullying programs are those that take a “whole-school approach” such as SEL. Social awareness and relationship skills also aid in the prevention of bullying, either by the better understanding of a student’s differences or intervention by bystanders to support the victim.

The state of Illinois was one of the first to institute SEL in their classrooms (2011). Illinois established three broad goals towards their Social Emotional Learning Standards: develop self-awareness and self-management skills to achieve school and life success; use social-awareness and interpersonal skills to establish and maintain positive relationships; demonstrate decision-making skills and responsible behaviors in personal, school and community contexts. Team members felt SEL was vital not only towards a child’s behavior but also in preparing them for a 21st Century workforce. Pilot schools’ results demonstrated students were “calmer about things” with significant drops in behavior referrals.

School and staff support is critical towards the success of SEL programs. For Illinois, 75 percent of school principals supported SEL; more than 90% in the late stages of implementation. CASEL’s findings also concluded it was not only the execution of SEL programs, but well-executed programs that demonstrated the best results. These strong findings and case studies have led other states to follow Illinois’ lead - Washington, Kansas, Tennessee, Pennsylvania and Oklahoma - despite budget shortfalls and programs cuts.

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