Jan. 5, 2012

The Halton Regional Police’s ongoing bullying prevention campaign was a major highlight of Sir Ernest MacMillan Public School’s late November MacMillan Empowerment Day event.

The event was designed to teach students tools to deal with bullying and that included a presentation from Halton police officers about its Give Respect Get Respect – Join The Movement campaign. The 2012 program will focus on the power of students to create a respectful positive environment to prevent bullying. The challenge has been extended to include Grades 6-12 Halton students. The deadline is April 1, 2012.

Sir Ernest MacMillan students were shown various posters and videos created by Halton District School Board high schools during the 2010-11 year. The winning Lester B. Pearson High School poster, entitled, “Words Can Hurt But They Also Can Heal”, has been appearing as an advertisement on buses in Oakville, Milton and Burlington.

“Students were really impacted by the creative participation of students throughout Halton,” says teacher DeepKiran Kallah of the bullying prevention campaign. “It's really inspiring to see how a high school student from Pearson has made an amazing anti-bullying poster.”

Other Empowerment speakers included Scott Dietrich of School Heroes Unite. His mission is to create a new culture of heroism and teamwork, one school at a time. He told the students about his experiences as a student and how he was bullied. 

Lori Stickle, Child Youth Counsellor, and Social Worker Stephanie Wallace had interactive workshop with primary students to discuss the theme, “How Can I Be a MacMillan Hero?”

“It definitely was a day of empowerment,” explains Kallah. “Students wrote it was great to have time to talk about bullying. They repeatedly said it is very important to tell an adult or teacher if they are being bullied. Overall, the success of the day was based on dialogue, feedback, and work done to solve conflicts and how to become empowered by taking action.”