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6 - England: the Sheffield project

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2009

By
Peter K. Smith ,
Sonia Sharp ,
Mike Eslea  and
David Thompson
Edited by
Peter K. Smith ,
Debra Pepler  and
Ken Rigby
Peter K. Smith
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths College, New Cross, London SE14 6NW, England, p.smith@gold.ac.uk
Sonia Sharp
Affiliation:
Educationleeds, 10th floor east, Merrion House, 110 Merrion Centre, Leeds LS2 8DT, England, sonia.sharp@educationleeds.co.uk
Mike Eslea
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, England, mjeslea@uclan.ac.uk
David Thompson
Affiliation:
Division of Education, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, England, D.A.Thompson@sheffield.ac.uk
Peter K. Smith
Affiliation:
Goldsmiths, University of London
Debra Pepler
Affiliation:
York University, Toronto
Ken Rigby
Affiliation:
University of South Australia
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Summary

Impetus for the intervention, early stages of planning, and funding

During 1989–90 school bullying started to become a topic of media attention and focused public concern in the UK. News was filtering through of the success of the Bergen evaluation in Norway. Several books on bullying appeared. The human rights issues involved in school bullying began to get a sympathetic hearing. The Gulbenkian Foundation (UK) started a 10-year period of making the topic of school bullying a priority area for funding and supported many important initiatives.

One project supported by Gulbenkian funds was the development of a ‘survey service’ for schools, at the University of Sheffield (Ahmad, Whitney, and Smith, 1991). This was based on a form of the Olweus questionnaire, modified for use in English schools. We piloted this questionnaire in several schools (Boulton and Underwood, 1992; Yates and Smith, 1989) and then carried out a survey of 24 schools in the Sheffield area, to give the first figures, based on a large-scale survey, of the extent of school bullying in English schools (Whitney and Smith, 1993).

At this time the Department for Education (DFE, as it then was: now, DfES or Department for Education and Skills) was not taking specific action on bullying. It had not been regarded as a major issue. The 1989 Elton Report on Discipline had raised it as one issue for schools to be concerned with, but the DFE had not acted specifically on this section of the report.

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Type
Chapter
Information
Bullying in Schools
How Successful Can Interventions Be?
 , pp. 99 - 124
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2004

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References

Ahmad, Y., Whitney, I., and Smith, P. K. (1991). A survey service for schools on bully/victim problems. In P. K. Smith and D. A. Thompson (eds.), Practical approaches to bullying. London: David Fulton, pp. 103–11
Boulton, M. J. and Underwood, K. (1992). Bully/victim problems among middle school children. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 62, 73–87CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cowie, H. and Sharp, S. (1992). Students themselves tackle the problem of bullying. Pastoral Care in Education, 10, 31–7Google Scholar
Elliott, M. (ed.) (1991). Bullying: A practical guide to coping for schools. Harlow: Longman
Eslea, M. and Smith, P. K. (1998). The long-term effectiveness of anti-bullying work in primary schools. Educational Research, 40, 203–18CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foster, P., Arora, C. M. J., and Thompson, D. A. (1990). A whole school approach to bullying. Pastoral Care in Education, 8, 13–17CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Olweus, D. (1991). Bully/victim problems among school children: Basic facts and effects of a school based intervention program. In D. Pepler and K. Rubin (eds.), The development and treatment of childhood aggression. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 411–48
Pikas, A. (1989). A pure concept of mobbing gives the best results for treatment. School Psychology International, 10, 95–104CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, P. K. and Sharp, S. (eds.) (1994). School bullying: Insights and perspectives. London: Routledge
Thompson, D. A. (1995). Two years on – problems in monitoring anti-bullying policies in school and their effects on the incidence of bullying. Paper presented at the BERA/EERA European Conference of Educational Research, University of Bath, UK
Thompson, D. A. and Sharp, S. (1994). Improving schools – establishing and integrating whole school behaviour policies. London: David Fulton
Thompson, D. and Arora, T. (1991). Why do children bully? An evaluation of the long-term effectiveness of a whole-school policy to minimise bullying. Pastoral Care in Education, 9, 8–12CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, D. A., Arora, T., and Sharp, S. (2002). Bullying – effective strategies for long term improvement. London: Routledge/Falmer
Whitney, I. and Smith, P. K. (1993). A survey of the nature and extent of bully/victim problems in junior/middle and secondary schools. Educational Research, 35, 3–25CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yates, C. and Smith, P. K. (1989). Bullying in two English comprehensive schools. In E. Roland and E. Munthe (eds.), Bullying: An international perspective. London: David Fulton, pp. 22–34

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  • England: the Sheffield project
    • By Peter K. Smith, Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths College, New Cross, London SE14 6NW, England, p.smith@gold.ac.uk, Sonia Sharp, Educationleeds, 10th floor east, Merrion House, 110 Merrion Centre, Leeds LS2 8DT, England, sonia.sharp@educationleeds.co.uk, Mike Eslea, Department of Psychology, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, England, mjeslea@uclan.ac.uk, David Thompson, Division of Education, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, England, D.A.Thompson@sheffield.ac.uk
  • Edited by Peter K. Smith, Goldsmiths, University of London, Debra Pepler, York University, Toronto, Ken Rigby, University of South Australia
  • Book: Bullying in Schools
  • Online publication: 02 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511584466.007
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  • England: the Sheffield project
    • By Peter K. Smith, Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths College, New Cross, London SE14 6NW, England, p.smith@gold.ac.uk, Sonia Sharp, Educationleeds, 10th floor east, Merrion House, 110 Merrion Centre, Leeds LS2 8DT, England, sonia.sharp@educationleeds.co.uk, Mike Eslea, Department of Psychology, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, England, mjeslea@uclan.ac.uk, David Thompson, Division of Education, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, England, D.A.Thompson@sheffield.ac.uk
  • Edited by Peter K. Smith, Goldsmiths, University of London, Debra Pepler, York University, Toronto, Ken Rigby, University of South Australia
  • Book: Bullying in Schools
  • Online publication: 02 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511584466.007
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • England: the Sheffield project
    • By Peter K. Smith, Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths College, New Cross, London SE14 6NW, England, p.smith@gold.ac.uk, Sonia Sharp, Educationleeds, 10th floor east, Merrion House, 110 Merrion Centre, Leeds LS2 8DT, England, sonia.sharp@educationleeds.co.uk, Mike Eslea, Department of Psychology, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, England, mjeslea@uclan.ac.uk, David Thompson, Division of Education, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, England, D.A.Thompson@sheffield.ac.uk
  • Edited by Peter K. Smith, Goldsmiths, University of London, Debra Pepler, York University, Toronto, Ken Rigby, University of South Australia
  • Book: Bullying in Schools
  • Online publication: 02 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511584466.007
Available formats
×