"Best Bets" to Promote Quality Platonic Peer Relationships:
Participation in Programs Similar to the Expect Respect Program

The Expect Respect Elementary School Project is an anti-bullying, -sexual harassment, and -gender violence program that employs a "whole school" approach to discourage these behaviors (Sanchez et al., in press). The program helped school staff and bus drivers to establish a universal understanding of, and consistent, effective responses to, bullying/sexual harassment; trained of counselors and organized special counseling sessions for victims of bullying/sexual harassment; developed a 12-session curricula to increase student awareness of, prevention of, and responsiveness to bullying/sexual harassment; designed education seminars for parents to learn how to prevent, recognize, and rehabilitate bullying/sexual harassment behavior; and disseminated information on community resources able to help in cases of violence and victimization. Participating schools also had partnerships with local universities and the lead agency of the project, SafePlace, from which they could resource expertise and information. A quasi-experimental evaluation Expect Respect in Texas, based on data from 747 fifth-graders split between six control and six treatment schools, yielded promising results: increases in treatment participants' ability to identify sexual harassment, knowledge of and awareness of bullying, and proactive reactions to bullying situations by intervening or telling an adult. . The may not be representative of fifth-graders in general, however, as data from participants who spoke only Spanish, did not complete surveys at all three collection times, or changed schools during the study were not included in the evaluation.


 
See Page 40 in Full Report

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