For Anti-Bullying Week (13th to the 17th of November 2023), The Centre for Vulnerable Children and Families at the Institute of Lifecourse Development ILD at the University of Greenwich led an international consortium of experts to look at the impact of bullying and how to combat it.
Experts from academia, research and practice saw through a week of activities with the aim of translating knowledge about bullying into resources that anyone working closely with children can use.
The activities focused on three areas.
The first was a series of daily webinars aimed at researchers and educational practitioners. Together they shared research behind bullying and cyberbullying, restorative practice as a component in anti-bullying strategy, university strategy in bullying intervention and educational materials to support teachers in bullying prevention.
The second was an event in collaboration with the Royal Borough of Greenwich, to celebrate the achievements of school children from eight local primary schools who have been trained as anti-bullying peer mediators.
The final event was a roundtable discussion which bought together research and practice with policy and looked at how bullying may evolve especially in cyberspace. The roundtable meeting was conducted with a wide range of partners including local schools, the Royal Borough of Greenwich Restorative Practice lead, researchers from three other universities and Young Consultants from Participation People - a youth voice charity who have undertaken significant work in Greenwich and who challenged the group’s certainties, adding a youth perspective to thinking and bringing in real-life context. At the end of the week there was commitment to getting the ideas discussed into accessible products.
Researchers at ILD have conducted extensive, international research into bullying and has for many years been at the forefront of globally recognised research addressing the impact of bullying at the earliest stages of child development.
Dr Amy Moon, Institute for Lifecourse Development said
‘We are delighted in how well-received our first series of anti-bullying week events have been. With support from Royal Borough of Greenwich and the Anti-bullying Alliance we managed to bring together practitioners, academics and young people to tackle this important issue, which can have such a huge impact on people's health, wellbeing and aspirations throughout the lifecourse. The week of events left us feeling uplifted and inspired to move forward with our goal of reducing bullying in all its forms.’