the end of the week, Park City Police Chief Wade Carpenter and his associate Peter Iacavazzi, who established the anti-bulling program called “Stand By Me,” hope to talk with every student at Treasure Mountain Junior High School about living civilly and settling conflicts without verbal or physical violence.
“The program is about being a good citizen and creating an environment where children can be civil with each other and create those relationships and trust with one another,” Carpenter said. “This is not a police department or school district issue; it’s in the community department. Everyone has to be involved. That’s the only way we’ll effectively change.”
Carpenter and Iacavazzi started working on the program more than a year ago when a bullying situation in Salt Lake City was brought to their attention.
“Originally we had a young man, named Christian, who went to school in Salt Lake. He struggled with being bullied in fifth grade through junior high. At one point, things became so bad for him that he wanted to walk out onto the playground and hang himself,” Iacavazzi said, adding that later when they spoke with Christian, he said he wished there was someone to stand by him through hard times, which is where they came up with the program’s name.
Iacavazzi has spent the last 12 years working with young women across the country on issues including rape and abuse. He said in the last couple of years, bullying has also become an important issue.
“Peter saw a need and has been receiving a lot of requests for an anti-bullying program. We wanted to actually speak with the children to create a program that was essentially created by the students,” Carpenter said. “We wanted the program to be inspirational and thought provoking and we wanted to talk with the kids. We asked the Park City School District to have access to kids so we could see the problems they deal with in their own school and to address problems that they deal with.”
Carpenter and Iacavazzi said from talking with their kids in the school district along with other students, they confirmed what they already knew about bullying in Park City schools.
“What we got from all the kids in Park City was a lot of what we already knew, that bullying does exist in Park City at all levels. The kids that we met with had been bullied or have bullied,” Carpenter said, adding that the school district offers several ways students can report and deal with bullying issues. The main goal is to take a proactive approach, he said.
Treasure Mountain Junior High School Vice Principal Kevin McIntosh agrees that taking a proactive approach is important and said the school has been working with Carpenter and Iacavazzi since the beginning of the year. McIntosh said there is bullying at the school, but it’s not something that students deal with regularly.
“We have to teach kids that this is not right and this is why, and the message has to be strong. We want to let parents and students know that it’s not acceptable, and it won’t be tolerated,” He said. “When it’s going on and we’re able to stop it, we use it as a teaching moment.”
Treasure Mountain 8th-grader Elaine Prom said she always feels safe at school and hasn’t witnessed many bullying cases. She said sometimes her peers make fun of girls with short hair, calling them lesbians. The teasing offends Prom because she knows it hurts the other girls’ feelings.
TMJHS student Maddie Knauer is a part of the Leadership class at the school. She said as leaders and role models, she feels obligated to step up and intervene in bullying situations.
For more information regarding the Stand by Me program, visit www.standbymeprogram.com .