Branstad issues executive order combating school bullying

CEDAR RAPIDS - Gov. Terry Branstad issued an executive order Monday aimed at combating bullying in Iowa schools, one that covers most of the provisions from bills he has tried unsuccessfully to get through the Legislature for three years.

The order, signed Monday afternoon at Arthur Elementary School in Cedar Rapids, establishes the Governor's Office for Bullying Prevention through the University of Northern Iowa's Center for Violence Prevention.

'We're not waiting for the Legislature,” Branstad said. ' ... Bullying is not acceptable. And we're going to do everything we can to stop it, to stamp it out in Iowa.”

The new office would be responsible for implementing several measures, including:

l Ensuring schools have access to training on anti-bullying policies and investigating bullying and harassment complaints.

l Promoting YourLifeIowa.org, an existing 24-hour hotline that students can call if they feel threatened, bullied or harassed at school.

l Working with the Iowa Department of Education to develop a procedure for notifying parents of bullying victims and alleged perpetrators in reported incidents.

l Working with the Iowa Department of Education to develop guidelines for responding to cyberbullying, including bullying through email, text messages, social media and other means.

l Working with schools and the Education Department to tackle inconsistencies in how schools across the state report bullying.

l Convening a working group to propose rules allowing victims of bullying or harassment to move to another school district through open enrollment and immediately be able to participate in varsity sports.

l Promoting a student mentoring program aimed at preventing and responding to bullying in schools and spreading best practices for middle-school and high-school students.

Many of those ideas were contained in anti-bullying legislation Branstad proposed this year, which passed the Senate but was voted down in the House in May. Branstad has made anti-bullying legislation a priority in the last three legislative sessions, but his proposals have come up short in the Legislature each time.

House Republican leaders said they were concerned with an exception to the parental notification requirement, which would have allowed school officials not to notify a victim's parents if they believed doing so would put the victim in danger of further harm.

That type of exception would protect lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students who have not come out to their parents, Nate Monson, the executive director of the advocacy group Iowa Safe Schools, said this past spring.

Branstad said Monday that the state has made progress the last three years raising awareness about bullying, citing two anti-bullying summits his office held.

According to the Iowa Youth Survey released earlier this year by the sate Department of Public Health, middle and high school-age girls appeared to be bullied more frequently than boys of the same ages, with more reporting they were made fun of, excluded or talked about than boys.

Survey results showed that 38 percent of girls said other students spread rumors about them, compared with 25 percent of boys who said the same thing.

The new office created under Branstad's order can be paid for using existing funding, the governor said. But he said he plans to ask the Legislature for additional funding during its next session.

l Comments: (319) 398-8204; andrew.phillips@thegazette.com