Bullying is a serious problem for people of all ages worldwide. At West High there are students and teachers that have experienced this negative effect in their lives.

Lisa Mounds-Craft, West High School counselor, says, “Bullies are cowards, meaning that sometimes they don’t have self esteem. They are cocky, think highly and are full of themselves.” In her life she had to deal with bullies but she’s not the only one who had to face them.

Why do people bully? Josie Peguero, 37, says, “Maybe their family member didn’t give them the love and the attention that they needed, or they feel like they want power over someone. Therefore they pick on innocent people In order to have some satisfaction.” Josie endured bullying almost her whole adolescent life. “Bullies lack of love, and they don’t know how to express themselves“ she says. “School bullying its a threatened by a peer whether its an adult or a student.”

Students can promote an anti-bullying zone. According to Lisa, ”If we have a common message that we care about each other, we have high expectations. With that in mind we don’t have time to mistreat and abuse each other.”

As a counselor, Lisa thinks of the West High community as a family. She notes the importance of creating a positive community. “We spend almost eight hours here at school. We don’t want to have a nice beautiful place on the exterior, but in the interior everybody is slapping each other and being in a place where we think it’s unsafe. In order to prevent that we should help each other out if we see someone is being bullied.”

In most schools, especially in elementary schools, they are starting to talk about bullying situations more often. The reason is to work as a team and family to help protect each other from bullies. Students can avoid being bullied by being involved in clubs or sports. It’s also the staff’s job to prepare the students for what to do when being in a bullying situation.