This story on bullying is pretty heartbreaking. Billy's case seems exceptionally violent to me -- most of the bullying I know of in suburban school districts is more verbal and emotional in nature. I was badly bullied as a youth -- chunky, bespectacled bookworms don't do so well on the schoolyard -- and it made for a miserable elementary, junior high, and early high school experience. Boys will be boys, you're told, and more to the point, groups will be groups, and they will settle on individuals whose exclusion strengthens their own sense of inclusion. I don't know how you set policy or pedagogy to change behavior that deeply interwoven into our social and cultural DNA. Unlike with Billy, school administrators were well aware of my problems, and deeply sympathetic, and totally ineffective. But it's a real problem for countless kids.
