DD still dealing with that same girl from my previous post. Without DD’s knowledge, got administration involved, and now bullying is EVEN WORSE. DD does not know that bully was “spoken to”, so she has no idea why bullying is now worse. Advice for mom? Help!
I can’t seem to remember or find your previous post. Can you be more specific about the type of bullying issues and the context? thanks.
@doschicos This was from the Fall, when I posted about sportsmanship, and the girl made a comment about “beating her”, etc. Her coach handled it and girl was “punished”.
Now, same student is making school life difficult for DD, i.e. physically blocking her from sitting down in row, making disgusted faces at her, snotty comments, trying to create a wedge between DD and the shared group of friends. DD is just ignoring it and, to avoid conflict, hanging out with her guy friends. Want DD to have a combination of both genders, of course. This all started because same girl was spreading malicious gossip about another student and my DD stood up to her.
Unfortunately, there always seems to be one of those “mean girls”. My daughter has encountered a few. I’ve always expressed to my daughter that it is usually the result of insecurities and jealousies. It says nothing about your daughter and a lot about the girl. Based on my experience, the best bet is to just keep one’s distance. It can take awhile, but the truth comes out in the end and others will realize the other girl’s true stripes. There has to be some other girls at the school that aren’t part of this bully’s mean girl pack. Those are the people your daughter should hang out with.
I do agree. But I already stuck my nose into it, and now it seems even worse. I am staying far away now, but mean girl thinks my DD was the one who reported her latest escapade, which she was not. I should have stayed out of this. But at least the administration has the mean girl on their radar now? So she will be watched more closely and perhaps get better? or is this a pipe dream?
My experience is that adults don’t get too involved in that kind of stuff, boarding school or day, public or private, at that age. The good thing is the end of the school year is nigh. Your daughter should focus in the fall of finding supportive and kind girls to hang around with. My daughter had 4 best buds by the end of boarding school. Two she didn’t really get to know until her junior year due to sharing a dorm with them. A lot of friendship circles change as people mature and learn. Encourage her to focus on building friendships with others who share her values.
I think you need to tell your daughter that you got involved so that she at least knows why the bullying has increased and she will be up to speed about what the administration already knows. She might be upset about it but she can stop blaming herself, which is probably what she’s doing now. Hopefully the situation can calm down over the summer.
I’m sorry this is happening.
Ugh. So sorry to hear about what your daughter is going through. I wish AOs had a fool proof way to screen for kindness. Sigh. I am so grateful that at my daughter’s summer camp, mean girls don’t get invited back for the next summer…
I’m so sorry for your DD. I highly recommend Odd Girl Out by Rachel Simmons. Simple read. I think all parents/educators of girls can learn from it. I gave it to my daughter to read as well. It has sparked many interesting conversations and talks about bullying/ girl culture
@mexusa I guess I would take a different approach. If I got involved and it didn’t solve it then I was escalate it further.
I also do not agree with the comment that “mean girls” are eventual exposed. I think many of these mean girls end up running the PTA and cant get past their cattiness.
Thank you to all who responded. Need to think about this…
@mexusa – One more thing I want to add. Every year there are high school suicides due to bullying. I believe the bullying you hear about from one’s child is really the overt tip of the iceberg bullying. But there is so much more passive aggressive below the sea water bullying that can wear even the strongest kid down. I believe bullying should be addressed forcefully.
Take a moment and think of the upside and the downside of stronger intervention vs. let the child handle it. It is time to channel the Mama Grizzley
To get any real traction with administration, it would probably require a clear overt act. A less obvious situation like making faces or snarky comments is a) hard to prove; b) can be dismissed as not “real” bullying; and, c) not really something that can be punished or controlled by adult intervention.
Is there a peer counseling program at the school, if so, that could be an avenue for your daughter to explore. Rather than a formal complaint, you could ask her advisor whether she has noticed anything between the two, which might put it on the radar as something for her to monitor in the school community and ask about during advisee meetings.
I’m really sorry this is happening to your daughter. You described how excited she was to attend her school and it stinks.
No real advice except to say that I agree with intervention. I’m extremely hands-off as a parent and believe my kids should solve their own issues, but bullying can’t be solved by the person being bullied. It can do lasting damage. The administration needs to either separate your daughter and the bully or make the bullying stop by other means. I would not hesitate to make myself a nuisance until this situation improved.
I really like @EarlyMTNester 's suggestions of peer counseling and talking to the advisor. SOME schools care about “micro-aggression” and aren’t going to wait until something bigger happens… WIth that said, at almost all of them, they’ll help the kids work it out themselves rather than stepping in and doing something heavy-handed. It’s one of the reasons that there are generally so many types of “leadership” roles for the kids (peer counselors, prefects, certain alliances, etc.); they’re at an age where adult intervention is often less effective than peer action.
The only thing that you may want to think about now is housing for next year. Do you or DD have any concerns that you should raise now on that front? Would it be helpful if they weren’t on the same floor? Or do you think they’d work it out if they were? I have nothing firm to offer on this but if you or DD have strong preferences based on what’s happened this year, the administration is most likely to be able to accommodate you if you speak up early.
Great, great advice from all. As for housing, DD will be a new boarder next year, and the bully will remain a day student. So, that should help a bit. I will be acting on all of your helpful insights.
Another vote here for “Odd Girl Out.” Here’s a link to the updated edition.
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/odd-girl-out-rachel-simmons/1100152169?ean=9780547520193&st=PLA&sid=BNB_DRS_Core+Shopping+Books_00000000&2sid=Google_&sourceId=PLGoP345&k_clickid=3x345
I wonder about the transition during the first year for some of these kids. I can imagine most of the students at Choate are high achieving, and are used to being the best. Maybe this young lady is struggling to adjust to her new environment? When social groups settle maybe it will get better…
What to do is a tough call. You’ve told the school and that only made things worse. You’re (with reason) worried that getting them involved again could exacerbate an already horrible situation. At the same time it’s tough to hold the school responsible if they don’t know what’s going on, and there’s not a whole lot you can do from a distance other than offering your daughter emotional support.
I don’t really have a solution but here’s what I’d do. Talk to the school again, but not just a single person. Gather whatever team the school would put in place for crisis intervention. If the school doesn’t see the need for a meeting you can always tell them the situation is at the point where you’re considering withdrawing her. That will get their attention fast. The group might include the Dean of Students, your student’s advisor, the school psychologist and the dean in charge of her grade. Talk to them about whether your daughter should be at the meeting. It may empower her to be able to tell her story. Don’t blame the school, but tell them what you’ve told us here, that after the school spoke with her the student escalated the bullying. The last thing the school will want will is a bullying scandal, and believe me, they’ve dealt with issues like this before, so they’ll want to work with you. Make sure to tell them how hard this has been on your daughter and be as specific as possible.
Do acknowledge how hard it is to track those little slights girls inflict on each other. Female members of the school team will probably remember what it was like in middle school and high school, but you may find some faculty clueless about how much a turned back or eye roll can sting. Working together as a group you can hopefully come up with a plan. At a minimum I would want multiple eyes on the situation-coaches, dorm parents, etc. watching out for those little snubs that might otherwise be written off as a minor tiff between friends. I would also consider separating the girls as much as possible. Don’t put them in the same dorm, put them in different sections of class if possible. It’s tough to really keep them apart at a small school but some breathing room might at least make being at school less stressful for your daughter.
Don’t let the school get away with the “let’s treat them as equally responsible and put them in counseling together” approach. In my experience it doesn’t work and I’ve even seen bullies use private information they’ve learned in counseling against their victim.
Would your daughter consider reading “Odd Girl Out” with you? It might be a good way to jump start a conversation with her. You wouldn’t even need to say it was because of her situation, just that you’re reading it for a book group (we’ll be your book group!) and want the opinion of someone in the trenches.
Hopefully the summer break and a new social mix in the fall will help to naturally ease the situation. Keep an eye on your daughter’s social media and support her as much as you can, including reassuring her that bullies often choose kids they see as social rivals to torment. IOW, you don’t have to be an odd girl to be the odd girl out.
Often other friends eventually catch on to the ugliness of bullying and pull away from the bully, but this doesn’t always happen because girls fear just what happened to your daughter, that by standing up for a bullied girl they’ll make themselves vulnerable.
Lots of sympathy for your situation.
Adding-just saw that your daughter will be a boarder and the other girl will be a day student. This should help, because your daughter will develop a set of boarding friends with whom she’s closer than the other girl will have an opportunity to be.
I agree with Sue22.
In the same situation, I would also have notified the administration. The behavior you described in #2 is not acceptable. “Mean girls” can be very good at choosing the time and place to do social bullying. It gets much harder when the adults have it on their radar screen.
The bullying could be “even worse” in an attempt to provoke a reaction from your daughter. Remind her the end of the year is coming, and that it is tactically important not to give the bully the reaction she wants.
It is good that she can shift to male friends, but that can also provoke “mean girls,” who are often inspired by envy.