Ridgewood School District details state HIB report
Monday October 22, 2012, 2:06 PM
BY  LAURA HERZOG
STAFF WRITER
The Ridgewood News

Despite a slight increase in harassment, bullying and intimidation (HIB) incidents in district schools, Ridgewood High School Assistant Principal Basil Pizzuto said there doesn’t seem to be any reason for alarm.

Less than one percent of the roughly 6,000 students in Ridgewood schools – 51 students – were involved in the incidents, he said.

About 10 more HIB incidents were recorded in the annual School Violence, Vandalism and Substance Abuse Report than last year, but the rest of the numbers were roughly the same, according to Pizzuto. He mainly attributed this to the increased “focus” on HIB in the past year, as well as a new, broader state definition of what constitutes a HIB incident.

Effective September 2011, the state specified that a single incident of harm can constitute a HIB report. Another change to the definition is the demonstration of a created “hostile educational environment” that interferes with a student’s education or “severely or pervasively caus[es] physical or emotional harm” to him or her.

“These [incidents], in the past, may have just been handled at the school level … Now we do a report,” Pizzuto said. He noted that in past years, an incident of bullying may have been handled by telling a student not to act in that way again, followed by a phone call to a parent.

Each annual report is broken down into two components – July 1 through Dec. 30 and Jan. 1 through June 30.

http://www.northjersey.com/news/175275361_Ridgewood_School_District_details_state_HIB_report.html

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