New Haven Register (Sunday) (New Haven, CT)
2018 suicide prompts changes to law
Bill changes definition from ‘repeated’ to single instance of bullying
An elementary school student named Anjelita Estrada, who recently moved to Cheshire with her mother and stepfather, committed suicide on Dec. 23, 2018. She was 11.
The death of Anjelita, a child remembered as “funny and charismatic,” devastated the Cheshire community. It also put renewed focus on the issue of bullying, after family members told authorities she had been tormented at school. They believed that to be the reason she decided to take her life.
During the just-ended legislative session, it mobilized lawmakers to review a law that requires school districts to report instances of bullying. It is not clear that the statute, enacted in 2002, last updated in 2011, has succeeded in its primary purpose: reducing instances in which children dread going to school to face ridicule or worse from their peers.
The law has serious flaws, which were made clear during a Hearst Connecticut review of state records and interviews with experts in the field. For one, it defines bullying as a series of repeated acts over time against one student, but does not specify what frequency qualifies as repeated, leaving it up to the discretion of each district. As a result, reporting varies greatly from town to town, and cases like Anjelita’s often do not register with state officials tracking bullying.
Statewide data show bullying rates fell from 1,233 cases in 2013-14, to 820 the following year. The cases then dipped even
further to 795 and 794, increasing again last year to 872. To experts, the low numbers are not a sign of progress, but a troubling indicator that bullying cases go underreported.
State records reveal the number of verified cases often is lower than experts say is accurate. For example, Stamford Public Schools, with a population of 16,802 kids, reported 14 cases of bullying last year. Greenwich — which is facing a lawsuit from parents who contend their son committed suicide in 2013 after suffering prolonged bullying — with a population of 9,113 kids, reported 7 verified acts. Fairfield, with a population of 9,825 kids, reported 4 verified acts. Bristol and New Haven, with populations of 7,997 and 21,518 respectively, reported almost equal cases of bullying, 19 and 20, respectively.
New Britain, with a population of 10,179, reported 118 cases. New Canaan, with a population of 4,171, reported 2 cases last year.
“The variability to me was really unbelievable,” said Faith Vos Winkel, a member of the Office of the Child Advocate who specializes in child fatality and prevention. “It made some sense. If no one is going to tell (a district) what ‘repeated over time’ is, you have districts with no bullying, and districts with a lot of bullying.”
Vos Winkel, who worked with legislators during the recent session on the issue of school climate, said the discrepancy is a result of how districts capture and report data. Districts with no bullying are no better than districts showing a lot of bullying, she said. The one with fewer reported cases is just coming up with its own definition of “repeated over time.”
During the 2019 legislative session, the state House and the Senate unanimously passed Bill No. 7215, which redefines bullying as a single act “that is direct or indirect and severe, persistent or pervasive.” It then borrows language about the effects of bullying from current law: The act has to cause physical or emotional harm to an individual, place an individual in reasonable fear of physical or emotional harm, or infringe on the rights or opportunities of an individual at school.
The bill awaits the signature of Gov. Ned Lamont, who has 15 days to sign it after he receives it this month.
“It’s a lot of terminology,” said Charlene Russell-Tucker, chief operating officer for the state Department of Education. “What does it look like? Will you recognize it when you see it?”
Vague definitions, low numbers
No one thing leads someone to commit suicide. In Anjelita’s case, police reports indicate there were tensions at home in addition to bullying she experienced at school. Immediately before Anjelita died, she fought with a family member, police officers wrote in their report. She was found alone in her bedroom 30-40 minutes later, unresponsive. Officers found no signs of foul play. Whether or not these tensions factored in her decision, or if there were other, yet unknown influences, is impossible to say.
But family members are steadfast in their belief that bullying played a role in her death. Family members whom police interviewed said Anjelita “felt bullied in school because she is Hispanic.” A child reportedly told her “Mexicans shouldn’t come across the border,” while another group of girls reportedly formed a group called the “Scangees,” a shortened form of “Scary Angees,” based on a nickname.
Under the current law, Public Act 11-232, which Governor Dan Malloy signed in July 2011, the district would have had to determine Anjelita’s alleged tormentors repeatedly harmed her physically or emotionally, or damaged her property, through communications, acts or gestures for her ordeal to qualify as bullying.
The new bill, introduced this past session by state Rep. Liz Linehan (D-Cheshire), recognizes that abusive treatment doesn’t have to be repeated to be damaging.
“One act can be significant and traumatizing,” Vos Winkel said. “I think in the end, we have a product that will help guide schools.”
Proponents of the bill hope it effectively clarifies the definition of bullying and pushes schools to intervene more quickly.
“This idea of ‘repeated over time,’ in particular, you could drive a train through that definition,” Vos Winkel said. “We’ve heard from people for quite a while that that was a real problem.”
Linehan said the definition was easily manipulated so that districts would not have to call what they saw bullying, and incidents would not have to be reported.
In recent years, some district school boards have caught on, and said the numbers in their schools are too low to be true.
Last year, the Bridgeport Board of Education slammed school administrators for underreporting cases of bullying — in 2017-18, the district reported 19 verified cases and 71 cases that were investigated.
The school board heralded the numbers this year as “more real” — from fall 2018 to March 2019, there were 327 accusations of bullying reported throughout the district. Of those, 43 were verified.
Some Shelton Board of Education members also contested the data their district collected. In Shelton during 2017-18 there were 10 verified instances of bullying among some 4,925 students. At the time, school officials attributed the low number in part to the state definition.
“I’m not surprised that that continues to be a disconnect over what should be reported and how,” Russell-Tucker said. “There’s a level of discrepancy between what people encounter and what a district finds.”
For that reason, Russell-Tucker emphasized training on definitions and reporting. “We’re constantly looking at data quality,” she said. “That’s a big part of the work, in working directly with districts.”
Legislators craft the law, but the state department is charged with implementation. Following the 2011 update, the department has provided districts with training in addition to resources for addressing classroom behavior and introducing restorative practices.
To implement the new law and the change in definition, the state department will need a roundup of what kinds of acts need to be reported, she said.
Parent education
In Anjelita’s case, her teachers and parents agreed that she was the victim of bullying. But sometimes, parents and school building leaders differ over what bullying looks like, and if the school is handling it appropriately.
Greenwich parent Nerlyn Pierson, who sits on the North Street School Safe School Climate Committee, said what constitutes bullying can be a source of confusion and disagreement for parents.
When a potential bullying situation arises, parents are vocal, but often need to be educated on what bullying is, Pierson said.
Once a parent or child reports an incident of potential bullying, administrators are supposed to conduct an investigation. Many times, they determine the child at fault exhibits behavior that needs to be addressed, but it does not rise to the level of bullying, she said.
“Even situations that aren’t deemed bullying are taken seriously and addressed by schools,” Pierson said. “And if a parent sees that is happening, then they’ll feel taken seriously and that things are being addressed.”
Within the law, individual school systems craft their own practices for dealing with the problem. In Meriden Public Schools — where a suicide that occurred in the early 2000s motivated passage of the original state bullying law — professionals navigate the ambiguous definition by intercepting bad behavior early.
Al Larson, an educational psychologist in Meriden schools, said he investigates many reports that are “students with conflicts … over-using the term ‘bullying.’”
Still, students in the district take a confidential climate survey in which they answer questions, including if they are often “hit or threatened” or if “mean rumors” are spread about them. If students report any of these incidents, the survey software sends automated emails to school psychologists, social workers and administrators.
Some of these incidents constitute bullying; others, problems that could eventually become bullying, so professionals call them “pre-bullying” incidents, investigate them and counsel the implicated students.
“I believe these trigger email investigations prevent future bullying and improve school climate,” Larson said.
The number of suspensions for bullying in the district has decreased from 18 suspensions in 2012-13 to 4 in 2017-18. The number of trigger emails has increased since then, from 373 in the fall of 2012 to 577 in the fall of 2017.
“Meriden has been paving the way,” Linehan said. “We want to figure out a way to make (the survey) state-wide.”
Generally, schools follow protocol and “do a thorough job,” in investigating reports of bullying, said Connecticut lawyer Mark Sherman, who specializes in bullying cases.
“The problem is really, that parents need to know there is a formal and fair process,” Sherman said. “And they don’t have that confidence yet.”
When parents suspect that the process is not being followed, Sherman and others like him step in. He said he receives two calls a week from parents about cases of bullying going unaddressed.
In those cases, he said, “parents feel their voices aren’t being heard.”
Anjelita’s teacher at Doolittle School “had reported bullying issues involving Anjelita (as the victim) to the school administration in the weeks etc. prior to her death,” according to police reports. Two instances were digitally submitted to the school’s administration via Google Docs in a “Bully Log.”
With legislators poised to change the law, Sherman welcomed the change in definition.
“This law makes it clearer,” he said. “It’ll certainly trigger more complaints.”
The bill also defines a positive school climate, emotional intelligence and social and emotional learning, three components experts say help prevent bullying. Russell-Tucker applauded the specific requirements the new bill contains for a school climate advisory collaborative, screenings for students who may be at risk for suicide and state-wide school climate surveys.
Von Winkel calls the bill a framework for thinking about wellness and wellbeing for kids. She hopes school systems will not just check boxes by reporting and bringing in experts, and will instead find ways to change their culture.
“Let’s stop counting,” she said. “Can we just all agree that we want to have an environment that is safe and secure and kids are being supported? Maybe the time will come that we can get rid of counting because everyone has a state-of-the-art framework.”
Linehan said the original version of her bill had a provision that actually eliminated the reporting mandate, in hopes it would get schools to treat each instance of bullying more seriously. The provision was removed in committee, but she plans to reintroduce it in a newer version during the next session.
“I firmly believe that districts are hesitant to call bullying ‘bullying’ because reporting to the state department puts a stain on their schools,” she said. “Instead of getting to the root cause, their only concern is how the school is viewed. Ultimately, the belief is that this effects housing values.”
Have hope
With financial support raised on GoFundMe, Anjelita’s father Anthony paid to have her brought home to New Mexico, where she lived most of her life, and buried. Afterward, he had one request.
“Get our message out there and maybe we can save another child’s life,” the father, who now lives in Arizona, wrote on the page. “Just maybe we can keep another family from having to suffer this pain.”
Linehan pledged to do just that. “I will honor Anjelita by fighting for change in her memory,” she wrote on GoFundMe. “My heart aches for your family, and I promise that your sweet angel will make a difference in the lives of other children.”
Vos Winkel, who calls Anjelita “Angie,” is reviewing her case as part of a thematic review of recent child deaths by suicide to make recommendations to the state.
“Suicide isn’t just about one thing,” she said. “There’s a tipping point.”
Kids experience pressures to keep up in school, have friends and fit in; they have disagreements with their parents; their peers say nasty things to them; and now, they worry about their social media appearance, which just confounds their other concerns, Vos Winkel said.
And because their brains are not fully developed, children are impulsive. They commit suicide because they think, “I can’t bear this right now.”
“People need to feel optimistic about themselves, about the future,” Vos Winkel said. “If we can get people to feel optimistic, to feel that tomorrow will be better.”