Orange County Grand Jury
• 2011-2012
• Agency Response
Response to:
Tustin Unified School District
Anti-Bullying Programs in Orange County Schools*
⚠️ Translation Notice: This content has been automatically translated. The original English text is the official version. Translation may contain errors.
⚠️ Este contenido ha sido traducido automáticamente. El texto original en inglés es la versión oficial. La traducción puede contener errores.
Findings and Recommendations 4 findings
F1
Not all Orange County schools use the same technology, procedures and codes to record bullying or harassment incidents. Response to Finding 1: The District agrees partially with this finding. The District agrees that not all Orange County schools use the same technology and procedures to record bullying or harassment incidents. Different districts use different databases and internal procedures to track bullying complaints. With regard to the codes used to record bullying or harassment incidents, prior to July 1, 2012, Education Code section 48900(r) defined bullying by reference to sexual harassment, threats, and intimidation (Education Code section 48900.4). The law did not contain a stand-alone definition of bullying. However, as of July 1, 2012, Education Code section 48900(r) provides a stand-alone definition of the term "bullying." (AB 1156) School districts throughout California are bound by this statute.
Related Recommendations (1)
R1
Recommend a county-wide compatible information system for reporting incidents of bullying be explored by all school districts.
F2
New legislation takes effect July 1, 2012, and broadens the definition of "Bullying." Response to Finding 2: The District agrees that AB 1156 provides a broader definition of "bullying" than was contained in prior law.
Related Recommendations (1)
R2
Recommend all county-wide schools agree upon the same definition of bullying.
F3
Education Code section 234.1 requiring posting of anti-bullying/anti- harassment policies in prescribed areas was not evident in all schools visited. The Orange County Superintendent of Schools has been directed to respond to Recommendations 4 and 5 BOARD OF EDUCATION Jonathan Abelove · Tammie Bullard · Lynn Davis · James Laird · Francine Scinto Response to Finding 3: The District cannot comment on what policies are posted in all schools through Orange County, but can respond only on behalf of the District itself. Finding 3 combines the requirement to post anti-discrimination/anti-harassment policies in prescribed areas with the requirement to post anti-bullying policies. The requirement for school districts to post their anti-bullying policy in all schools and offices, including staff lounges and pupil government meeting rooms, is new as of July 1, 2012. Thus, the District disagrees with Finding 3 to the extent it reflects on the District's practice in regard to posting its anti-bullying policy in prescribed areas prior to July 1, 2012. In regard to the finding that the District failed to post its anti-harassment policies in prescribed areas, the District disagrees with this finding. The district has provided discrimination/anti-harassment policies to all sites (schools and others) to post in classrooms and other prescribed areas.
Related Recommendations (1)
R3
This recommendation has been implemented. As of July 1, 2012, AB 1156 and Education Code 48900(r) have been amended and broadened to define bullying as follows: "Bullying" means any severe or pervasive physical or verbal act or conduct, including communications made in writing or by means of an electronic act, and including one or more acts committed by a pupil or group of pupils as defined in Section 48900.2, 48900.3, or 48900.4, directed toward one or more pupils that has or can be reasonably predicted to have the effect of one of or more of the following: a. Placing a reasonable pupil or pupils in fear of harm to that pupil's or those pupils' person or property. b. Causing a reasonable pupil to experience a substantial detrimental effect on his or her physical or mental health. c. Causing a reasonable pupil to experience substantial interference with his or her academic performance. d. Causing a reasonable pupil to experience substantial interference with his or her ability to participate in or benefit from the services, activities or privileges provided by a school. On August 27, 2012, the District adopted updated Board policies on bullying and cyberbullying that included policy in regard to retaliation and confidentiality. Refer to Attachment Board Policy 5131.2 on Bullying.
F4
Based on witness testimony, confidentiality was not maintained in a bullying incident as prescribed in California Education Code section 234.1 Response to Finding 4: The Grand Jury report does not contain sufficient information to enable the District to respond to this finding nor does it identify which school district was involved in the alleged breach of confidentiality; therefore, the District disagrees wholly with this finding.
No recommendations for this finding
* This report's PDF did not contain easily extractable text and required Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for analysis. There may be minor errors in the extracted findings and recommendations due to OCR limitations with scanned documents.