One course ahead
- Tags: active witnesses, discipline and mediation, inter-course bullying, name-calling and obscene gestures, safe routes
Setting
It’s the change of classes between 7th and 8th grade. The hallway sounds like a tunnel: lockers close loudly, folders open and a teacher tries to move against the current. In the background, Cosmin’s band (8th grade) occupies a corner as if it were his stage; the fluorescent light flickers and lengthens the shadows of gestures.
Situation
For you, school is a place of discovery, but for months now every day starts the same way: Cosmin’s gang welcomes you with obscene gestures and nicknames. Sometimes they block your way, sometimes they whistle when you raise your hand in class. You learn to find routes to avoid them and shrink back every time you hear their laughter. You try to remind yourself that you come to learn, but the classroom door seems farther and farther away.
Key dialogue
– “Look at him, the nerd…”
– “Let me through.”
– (laughter and obscene gesture)
– “It’s no joke if it makes me want to foul.”
Rewrite the story
I’m another 7th grader and today I’m not letting you stand alone.
Now (10 s): I walk by your side and say clearly, “Space. No name-calling or gestures.”
2. Safe exit (1-2 min): make room for the classroom/hallway guard and say, “We have bullying in the 7th-8th grade hallway”.
3. Name without a fight: “What you are doing is repeated bullying. We stop here.
4. Registration (5 min): I write down with you time, place, names; we give it to tutoring/CPE and ask for no-contact and vigilance in that section.
5. Group: cut the gossip in the chat (“don’t forward, delete”) and add two allies to support it.
6. Week 1: I propose to the tutor: safe entry route, monitored “hot spots” and shared cut-off signal (“Stop, we take care of you here”).
7. If there is retaliation: we raise it with two witnesses and ask for formal mediation; support for you at recess (support pairs).
Roles at table: 7th grade student (protagonist), Cosmin (8th grade leader), gang members, peer ally (narrator), teacher on duty, CPE/tutoring, passive witnesses who can be activated.