Evaluating a Skills-Based Approach to Bullying Prevention

In the following paper, I present an evaluation of the bullying prevention program designed and delivered by the John Howard Society of Waterloo-Wellington (JHS WW). A mixed-methods approach involving both quantitative and qualitative data collection was used to assess the program impacts on children receiving the primary stream of the program (Pre-Kindergarten through Grade 3), and the junior stream of the program (Grades 4 through 6). A case study was also conducted to assess the impacts of the program one year after program delivery and after two consecutive years of programming. Finally, all school staff members were invited to respond to a survey designed to assess their impressions of the program and its effectiveness. In total, 384 students from 6 schools (3 intervention, n = 151, and 3 comparison, n = 197), and 18 teachers from the intervention sites participated in the study. Findings from the evaluation indicate several significant positive outcomes, particularly with respect to various cognitive beliefs and rates of bullying. These impacts were particularly strong for youth receiving the junior stream of the program. Data analysis also revealed that while program impacts may attenuate over the long-term, providing a second year of programming reduced such attenuation, and resulted in even stronger positive changes than did only one year of programming. Qualitative data analysis indicates that knowledge acquisition based on program concepts was strong for youth in both levels of the programming. Further, data from school staff surveys support these positive findings. Strengths and limitations, program recommendations, and knowledge translation strategies are also discussed