Youth task force launches kindness campaign

Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Nevada Daily Mail

I choose kindness.

The Vernon County Youth Task Force's anti-bullying campaign would like for these three words to describe a lifestyle in Nevada

In the third installment of the campaign, members of the community met to develop a media campaign to inundate the community with positivity.

"It really starts with each one of us taking responsibility," Tricia Bridgwater said. "If I respond to bullies at their level, I'm no better than they are. I like this because I can apply this everywhere. I can choose to be kind."

Missouri Extension Youth Program Assistant Chris Mosbrucker suggested placing a blurb in the newspaper and on the radio once a week highlighting a random act of kindness noticed in the community.

"We could post it on Facebook and track this," Mosbrucker said. "We could see how many people share it and if anybody cares."

Bridgewater supported the idea and said research shows positive campaigns reach more people than negative ones.

"How can we translate this to teach a community good social skills, good conflict resolution skills and good self-esteem?" she posed to the attendees.

James McKenzie, Vernon County Ambulance District director, suggested pairing children with business leaders in the community.

"We need people who've started their own businesses to talk to these kids and tell them it's not all doom and gloom out there," McKenzie said. "They're faced with a lot of uncertainty; they need some kind of hope."

Dana Redburn, Parks and Recreation director, suggested adults meet with children at the community center rather than school.

"Kids sit in classes all day long, they don't want to sit in a meeting or lecture," Redburn said. "If you challenge a successful person to spend two hours at the community center informally, I guarantee kids will approach you and ask what you're doing. If you come in and play ping pong, you're going to strike up a conversation with a whole group of kids and you're going to make an impact on them. They want you to come down on their level, they want to have a good time, and then they will ask questions and get candid, honest answers."

Juvenile correction officer Jennifer Thomas said a lunch buddy program would also benefit the children.

"If you challenge someone to go eat lunch once a month with a student, the kids will be excited," Thomas said. "They are so excited when I come in and eat lunch with them."

Mosbrucker cautioned trying to make a relationship between youth and organizations.

"You don't make a relationship with an organization," she said. "It needs to be a handful of people on a regular basis, two people teams would work and give consistency and trust over time. Without longevity you have no relationship."

In addition to the media campaign, the group discussed bystander and victim teaching programs.

"Cottey College is going to provide the bystander program, where people can express themselves in a healthy manner and get the appropriate skills to help whoever's being bullied," Bridgewater said.

Bridgewater said research shows the person who's being bullied needs to learn how to handle him or herself.

"If I, as a child, do not learn the skills of how to stand up for myself, then as an adult I probably won't have that skill set," she said.

She suggested the police department, the juvenile correction department and mental health professionals partner to provide instruction for victims.

As a third part of the campaign, the group discussed involving restaurants in a promotion.

"They would promote kindness and give some kind of reward for when something happens in the restaurant," Bridgewater explained. The group decided to seek Sonic's and Casey's involvement.

The community members will meet with members of the school district at 10 a.m., Jan. 23, at the community center for the next step in the campaign against bullying.

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