West Corners, NY (WBNG BInghamton) The start of the school year is just around the corner.
And for more and more students, it can be a stressful year of dealing with harassment as much as homework.
Action News Reporter Leigh Dana shows us how one school is using a federally funded program to help kids help each other.
Parents and teachers role play a mock up of how kids can be harassed during school hours.
It's part of a two day anti-bullying training course at Ann G McGuinness Intermediate School in the Union Endicott School District.
"The effort is really to create a healthy supportive school environment for all young people," said Joan Vitkus with Student Support Services Center.
"So that they want to co me to school and learn?"
"Exactly because if they're absent because they have fears about coming school, their absent from the learning and they suffer academically," she added.
Experts say that most bullies get most of their power from bystanders, or those who do nothing in the situation.
They want to change that by targeting those bystanders, to get them to support the person that's being bullied.
"What we find is that most students want to act, they certainly are aware of what's happening when students are bullied by they don't know how to act," said Vitkus.
Teacher Mary Ziegler, who portrayed the bystander during role play -- now has more of a vision on how to put a stop to harassers during the school day.
"I want to decrease the bully behavior, but at the same time I want to empower the silent majority and do nothing that sit back and laugh," said Ziegler.
Teaching others that it's not just the bullies that are going to be addressed after an altercation, but the ones who watch..
In West Corners, Leigh Dana, WBNG TV Action News.
Ann G McGuinness is the first school in the area to take part in the Olweus Bullying Prevention Training Program..
10 other schools in the Southern Tier plan to participate within the next 4 years.
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