On April 20, 1999, the Columbine High School shootings shocked the nation, thus bringing school violence and bullying to the forefront.  For the first time, Americans had to acknowledge that bullying is more than just occasional teasing and playground scuffles.  Even now, many years later, bullying continues to make the headlines in the news or on magazine covers. 

Dan Olweus (1993), an international authority on bullying, defines bullying as when a student “is exposed, repeatedly over time, to negative actions on the part of one or more students” (p. 9).

Physical bullying includes hitting, kicking, or shoving, but bullying can also be indirect such as teasing, gestures, making faces, social exclusion, and rumor spreading (Soutter & McKenzie, 2000).  The key distinction between bullying and fighting is that with fighting the students are equally matched, but with bullying there is an imbalance of power or strength (Olweus, 1993).

School nurses have a pivotal role in caring for students who are impacted by bullying because they have a rapport with the students that is unique compared to that of other school employees.  Because the school nurse is not in a disciplinary role, students are more apt to confide in the nurse.  As a result, when bullying occurs in school, nurses are often the first adult both the victim and the bully go to for help, thus making nursing the ideal profession to coordinate care for those involved in bullying episodes.   In the elementary school, a school nurse can have a dramatic impact on assessing, planning, and coordinating care for victims and perpetrators of bullying.

This website was created as a partial requirement for a Master's of Education with a Concentration in School Nursing at Cambridge College in Massachusetts. The goal of the website is to educate elementary school nurses about bullying and empower them to become effective bullying case managers through the use of the Neuman Systems Model created by nursing theorist Betty Neuman.