(music.)
Hi everybody I'm Julie Moran and I'm
Olga Villaverde.
Today is a more serious show but it's
about a topic that is so important to
discuss right now and we're talking
about bullying.
Bullying has plagued so
many of our schools and has caused some
students to take drastic measures just
to try to make the pain stop, sometimes even leading to
suicide.
So what's being done to prevent
this?
This morning we talked to kids who
have experienced bullying firsthand,
organizations who have helped them and
many more and a seven-year-old girl who
says all she wants is sunshine in every
single person's day.
The Balancing Act
starts right now.
Joining us now to talk about their
experiences with being bullied are Stevencia
and Jackson, and we are so glad you joined us in the studio
today guys.
Thank you for having us.
Thank you for coming and sharing your
stories.
Jackson let me start with you
you were the target of bullying Stevencia
you also.
Tell me what happened?
Well growing up in a Haitian
household our parents never really had money
to buy the luxury items for us to go to
school like the nice shoes, the nice
clothes, so we only have money for the bare
necessities, so when we went to school we
went to school with the things that we
had.
Of course.
Other students in school
make fun of us because of that and you
know say we need to go back to our
country, you know we don't belong here,
and that kind of like breaks down your
spirit.
How did you feel like at that moment
Jackson?
like I said lonely you know
depressed isolated from the world.
Stevencia when did you become the
target of bullying?
Umm in third grade
we were like having um like a play time
in class and so I decided to walk around
and try to make talk to people, and I
went to these two kids and they were telling
me that my skirt was too short, and that
I was too big to fit in a skirt like
that.
As I grew up I became really
insecure about my body.
So when you
reached out to people even your parents
you didn't feel like you really got the
help you needed.
To this date like no one
ever really knew that I was bullied in
third grade.
But you know what's amazing
about this and Julie and I were talking
about is the fact that you two were
strong enough to overcome this and you
two are doing something remarkable today,
Jackson I want to start with you first
of all I know you have a full ride to
FSU so congratulations to you and
obviously this has not affected you and
you you have moved forward, god bless you
and you're helping others.
Yes ma'am.
So yeah I realized that you know
you gotta take the bad and see the bright
side out of it.
So now I'm giving back to the
teens as a national Heisman winner I
visit various middle schools and elementary schools to let the
teens know that if you put it in your head
that you want to be something, you want
to be somebody, you can be somebody,
all you gotta do is believe in yourself first,
see I didn't believe myself as a kid I was
believing what they was telling me until I
realized I want to be successful.
Supporting several nonprofit organization I focused on making
a sustainable and innovative
community, my music, I'm educating the youth,
motivate and empower teens to be successful leaders, and
Stevencia where does your confidence come from
now?
My confidence comes from the word
that my pastor told me he told me that I
wasn't unwanted when he told me that I
wasn't I wanted I started to like really
really cry and I was just like this is
true like I don't feel unwanted, that
summer I started to feel better about
myself and now I'm really confident in what
I do I am a safe school ambassador
helping kids start to believe in
themselves and stop bullying for the people
that are going through it.
Stevencia I see it in your eyes, the
sky's the limit for you you're gonna be
a junior next year you go get them.
Thank you.
She's gonna do great.
I hear he's
gonna be a lawyer, apparently you're gonna study
for that?
Maybe a governor maybe President of the United States.
Oh yeah!
President Jackson go for that!
God bless you both thank you so much it
was great having you here.
We'll be right
back.
(music) Dennis Estimon a Haitian
immigrant who first came to the US in first
grade says he often felt isolated at school
especially at lunchtime, so Denis along
with a few friends started a club called
We Dine Together.
As this program grew
they partnered with Be Strong a national
nonprofit organization focused on
preventing bullying, welcome Dennis it's
so great to have you in the studio.
Thanks for having me.
And I want to know why did you start
We Dined Together.
We Dined Together is a student-led initiative that
started in my high school to combat social
isolation.
We noticed a great divide in
our school we decided to bring people
together to share a meal with one
another and actually be advocates so I
like to say that that we dine together
club for a new student maybe a welcoming
committee or for a student that may be
bullied it's a safe haven but for the
school it's a catalyst for change.
And were you bullied?
Yes I was bullied and
that's where it all stems from.
The feeling of isolation, the
feeling of depression, and I don't want
anybody else to go through that and now what
we notice is now many students all
over the nation are you know stepping in
and deciding to be that change that
they want to see because truth be
told if we don't then who will?
I feel like there
are some pre-established groups who are
supposed to fit in.
And we dine together breaks it up.
It's a very honest place to be,
everyone kind of just says what's on their mind
and it's really judgement free.
Dining together
has changed my life, I met a lot of people and my English
got better since then.
Students like these
are the reason we dined together work so
well.
I think the biggest help, biggest thing
made to me is helping meet new people
that otherwise I wouldn't have met.
It's really cool to see that there's
a universal language here for one
people love food everywhere and too
more than that people love that they feel
valued and they feel wanted.
Jordan Hernandez is an English teacher
at Boca Raton Community High School and
the advisor of we dined together who
helped start the group with Dennis and
three other students.
If you are so
interested in being like on a committee
if you want to join it, it's really cool
to see this this bridge of a huge chasm
of isolationism kids that feel lonely
they don't feel like they're them true
themselves and so they come here and
they kind of find themselves a little
bit and making new relationships and
it's been really neat to see the students that feel like they
don't have the voice walking out of here
just super talkative, super confident and
with a new identity.
Building a relationship with
people right?
Spreading unity right?
Promoting togetherness, we believe that
if we're not moving together we're not
moving at all.
This is such a cool
organization I mean how can someone be a
member and what about a new school
signing up?
Well the first step is
nominating a be strong state rep and
then after the nomination process we
then feel the state reps with different
activities, advocacy, awareness that they
can go through throughout the months to
really mobilize them and help them be
the agents of change that we want them
to be.
And where can people go to find
out more?
People can go to be strong dot
global to find out more information.
Well you're just the most awesome
ambassador and it was so great having you
in the studio.
Thank you very much for having me.
All right now don't go away joining us
when we come back is a great friend of
Denis' and the executive director of Be
Strong, Ashleigh Cromer, we'll be right
back.
(music.)
Well I've been talking to Dennis Estaban
co-founder of We Dine Together and
director of be strong and joining us now
is Ashleigh Cromer Executive Director of Be
Strong a national nonprofit organization
focused on preventing bullying.
Welcome great to have you here.
Now Ashleigh tell
us how did this all start for you?
Wow be strong was founded was from the
heart of parents who their son was
directly affected by bullying and they
started to go through the process of really
looking at what types of solutions were
there they didn't find something that
was a comprehensive approach and a
resource that would help their son and
what their son was able to find was
resiliency and that was really such a tool for
him and so this family decided to take
the charge on putting together an
organization that would provide resources for schools,
communities and families.
And I love the name, I mean just
Be Strong.
What is the actual mission?
Our mission is really to see those
statistics that unfortunately we're
seeing increasing you know about four
years ago six point seven percent of
ninth through 12th graders had attempted
to end their life one or more times and
so the role for be strong is knowing
that the anti-bullying and the bullying
prevention efforts they're no longer
working and we saw an opportunity in a
boy to step in and really get behind
students and really create the shift in
the change that needed to happen but
that disruption for good happening
from the bottom up versus a top-down
model but that also supports our educators.
Our educators our taxed, our
public school system time we serve every
single part of that equation and we do
it through a comprehensive approach.
And Dennis how did you two get
involved together both of your
organization's.
We both believe in the same things
we both believe that past efforts are
not working now what can we do
together to make that difference.
And for though we
dine together clubs it's a scalable
model.
I love that now Ashleigh what is the
approach you take to prevent bullying?
It's really teaching about resiliency we
do share through our events we have a
student state representative program
they're the founders of there we dine
together clubs, we have an app that is
a free resource that connects students
to resources but it also meets them where they are.
You know it's very easy for you to tell your daughter call 911
if when your friends is suicidal but the
statistics that support them actually
taking action are very low, so we created
an experiential app that brings these
resources to them but in a comfortable
way for them.
Where is the app and how can you download
it?
It is available on Apple and
Android and it is a free resource 911
resources, cry success line, suicide
hotline, safe group and so what the app does
is anywhere you are in the US and
Canada you put in your zip code and it
aggregates all of the local nonprofit
resources so if your child meets a child
who's hungry they together can find a
local resource because we know children
who have not eaten for three days could
have some aggression and in the last two
years we've had 200, over two hundred
thousand searches from students.
Number one food insecurity, which we
know one out of four going to school
hungry and the second is escaping violence,
if we can mobilize and get these tools
into the hands of our students we
believe that's where the change will
occur and then the fourth prong we have is
an 8-week resilience program and
the way that it was positioned is the
the donors and the generous people with
their hearts that came together to
make it said you know what just have a
local community fund the textbooks we
cover everything else.
So realistically a
school can partner with be strong and
they have a fee of maybe maybe five
hundred dollars a year.
Wow and it's ongoing messaging morning
announcements constituting around the
hallways but it's from the victory, we
are not victims and the reality is is in
transformative resilience that darkness
will come but we owe our children the
toolkit in the toolbox to be able to
navigate that.
How can we be involved you
go to be strong dot global and you're
able to nominate a student because again
we're student-led so that's how we
engage with the school.
A student is
nominated for the reasons of how they're
providing a more inclusive tomorrow once
that student becomes a leader let be
strong take it from there and then we go
into into the schools and really carry
out that relationship.
So how can people donate?
I love that question almost more than any
question.
More than the app questions.
So we are a non-profit and the way
you can donate is directly on our site
you can text you can also send us a
check you can also donate directly on
Facebook and I think an important thing is we
have donors in a group of donors who
cover our operating cost so when you
give to be strong 100 percent of your
proceeds is going into the work that we
do and we have a 25 cent impact number we
have reached 3.4 million students
with a message of hope and resiliency
in three years and we have 50 million
that we need to reach so please help us
get there.
Thank you so much being here and for joining us.
And to find out more about be strong
and how you can get involved go to be
strong global we also have more
information of course on our website at
thebalancingact.com and don't go away
because joining us next to talk about safe
social media use and how you can promote
the positive positive use of technology
to your kids is cyberbullying expert Dr.
Samir Hinduja.
We'll be right back.
(music)
(music.)
Cyber bullying has become increasingly
common especially among teenagers so how
can we protect our kids from this or is
it even possible to protect them from
the cyber world?
Joining me now via Skype
to talk about cyber bullying and how to
promote the positive use of technology
is Dr. Samir Hinduja co-director of the
cyberbullying Research Center.
Good morning doctor thank you so much
for joining us.
Thank you for having me.
Let's talk about cyber bullying what
exactly is it?
We defined cyber bullying as
willful and repeated harm inflicted
through the use of computers or cell
phones or other electronic devices but
honestly it's just basically being a
jerk, using these new technologies.
How do we protect our children today
from this?
I just want adults that serve youth
whether it's in schools or whether it's
at home to be involved in the lives of
those youth and we know that those lives
are lived online and offline and many
adults talk about the offline aspects
but they neglect the online aspects
maybe because they're nervous about
using the right technological jargon or
just very unfamiliar with the terrain
but again just broaching the conversation with you,
conveys to them that you're interested
in their lives and you want to chat with
them about it in a non-judgmental and
non critical way.
Do you think that
dialogue that communication can then
bring positive aspects at home because
it's even happening at home.
Yeah absolutely I think just having that
conversation makes sure that those kids
whenever they struggle with something that's
unpleasant or makes them uncomfortable
or creeped out in their normal lives
they're willing to chat with the parents
because they know that that parent is
not going to freak out freak out or fly
off the handle or engage in some sort of
reflective neejerk disciplinary measures.
What do you think schools can do
to to even help prevent cyberbullying?
What I think is most important is in
schools is for those schools to focus on
building a positive school climate and
that's simply devoting resources and
time and energy to improving the connectedness and the
belongingness and the morale and the school spirit
and the feelings and perceptions of
safety all that goes such a long way in
decreasing problematic behaviors, but
also increasing the behaviors you and I
want to see for example better academic
achievement, better attendance and more
involvement at school.
Doctor a final
question I want to ask you is also not
only talking to children about it but
also reinforcing to them that they can
seek you for help correct?
Absolutely always available and wanting to
make a difference I think that matters
that you continue to convey that kids are
definitely surveying the landscape to
find out who they can chat with about
these issues, they're just nervous and
they want to do so in a safe and comfortable way.
And hopefully one day at a
time we can stop this and prevent it
from happening.
Absolutely and I think
that again with everyone on board it
makes a huge difference.
Thank you so
much for your time I do appreciate it.
Thank you for having me.
And to find out
more about Dr. Samir Hinduja dot org
you can go to his website that's Hinduja dot
org or you can also go to our website
thebalancingact.com.
Watch how this
little girl is making a big difference
one chair at a time.
Kindness is a wave that
never stops, an echo that never ends, kindness and a light that
never dims.
Kindness and love aways wins.
Mayal may just be 7 years old but she's on
a mission to change the world, one
project at a time with her mom Lauren
cheering her on all the way.
From a very early age she was doing kindness
notes in preschool with lucky pennies,
always there to help others and that's
what she wants to do and if you ask her
what she wants to be she wants to be a
doctor because I want to help others.
Ayal first received worldwide attention
with her kindness rocks project after the
story went viral.
We were watching the news and
there was a news story that flashed up
and it happened to be about a vandalized
cemetery and she said mommy I want to
help and I said okay and she said I want
to paint rocks, she painted ladybugs for
a good luck, and hearts for a little love.
It was overwhelming to see the response
she it was heartwarming now.
Ayal has a new project called Sunny Seats
to honor those who lost their lives in
the parklands shooting.
I felt sad and
heartbroken.
Ayal got to work right away
painting her sunny seat chairs to place
at the high school as a memorial for
those who died in the tragedy.
I am
planning to bring them to Marjorie Stoneman
Douglas because I don't want anyone
to ever forget these lives that were
lost.
I will work as hard as I have to to
make sure she has everything she needs
to change this world.
I know!
I can!
And I will make a difference in
the world!
At the end of the day, kindness and love
still exist.
If you want to help Ayal with
supplies go to fund me.com and search for sunny seats to
honor 17 Souls,
we'll also have information on our
website at thebalancingact.com.
If you or someone you know is in a crisis
struggling with suicidal thoughts,
depression, bullying or self-harm
download the be strong app and go to
immediate help.
We'll have more information on all these amazing
organizations you heard about today on
our website and that's thebalancingact.com.
Thanks for watching.
So long everybody.