San Jose Mom Targets School Bullying After Daughter's Near Suicide
SAN JOSE (KCBS) - Hundreds of parents and students were expected to attend a community meeting in San Jose Tuesday night to address what many say is rampant bullying on local school campuses.
KCBS' Mike Colgan Reports:
"You see people walking around pushing each other, calling each other foul language. And then online through text messages threats, sexist comments, just the whole nine yards," described Dylan Craddock, a senior at Andrew Hill High School in San Jose.
National statistics suggested 160,000 students missed school every day out of fear of being bullied.
Craddock agreed that bullying had reached epidemic levels.
"It's more verbal than physical, mainly. Name calling, just general put downs, you know? Demeaning people's personalities."
Tuesday's meeting was organized by Ann Brownell, whose daughter tried to commit suicide at the age of 16, after being bullied by peers in San Jose.
"One day I picked her up from school and she turned on her phone and her phone was beeping and beeping and beeping and I'm like, ok are those all text messages? And she said yes and I said, ok what is going on? We hadn't even left the campus yet," recalled Brownell.
She said more needed to be done to address the problem.
"The kids are not talking about it because they're afraid that if they say anything that the bullying will be worse," she warned. "And they think that if parents intervene that nothing will be done."
Parents and students were invited to participate in the meeting, Tuesday at 7:00 p.m. at Cambrian Park United Methodist Church, 1919 Gunston Way, San Jose.
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