Teachers\u27 Attitudes on Reporting Incidents of Student Bullying Among Middle and High School Students

Using a Quasi-Experiment research design, this study investigated teachers’ attitudes on reporting bullying in schools in Lead Public Charter Schools in Davidson County and Maury County Schools. The sample of the current study consisted of 287 middle and high school teachers. The researcher’s primary purpose of this study is to examine whether teachers’ attitudes about bullying will influence their decision to intervene while witnessing acts of student bullying. Second, it will also determine if a teachers’ age, gender, years of teaching experience, and training will influence whether teachers notice incidents of bullying, and whether they intervene while witnessing acts of student bullying. Third, the current research study will determine what specific attitudinal barriers position teachers in the role of bystander in bullying episodes. Lastly, do teachers’ attitudes have an effect on their decision to respond based upon who they believed to be responsible for intervening in student bullying situations? The results indicated that teachers did not know that bullying occurs in the various locations throughout the school building. Therefore, teachers remain in the role of the bystander. An analysis of the data revealed teachers between the ages of twenty through twenty-four and twenty-five through thirty-four reported statistically significant greater scores on Bullying Locations than did teachers aged forty-five through fifty-four and those teachers over fifty-five. Teachers who had taught the least number of years reported the occurrence of bullying within the school, and male teachers reported greater scores on Bullying Locations than female teachers. Teachers between the ages of thirty-five through forty-four reported a statistically significant lower number of reasons for not intervening than did teachers between the ages of twenty through fifty-four. Female teachers reported a significantly greater number of Reasons for Not Intervening than did their male counterparts. Teachers who reported receiving training in bullying intervention responded significantly lower on Perception Severity and Bullying Locations than did teachers who reported receiving no training in bullying intervention. With respect to teachers’ personal reasons for not intervening; teachers who reported not receiving training reported a statistically significantly greater number of Personal Reasons for not Intervening than did teachers who received training