Children Lost to Bullying

By: Brenda Rodriguez & XiomaraRoman

Mitchell Wilson An 11-year-old boy with muscular dystrophy committed suicide by suffocating himself months after being bullied and robbed of an iPhone. Mitchell Wilson, of Pickering in Ontario, Canada, was out walking when his face and teeth were smashed into the pavement by a boy from his school.A 12-year-old was arrested and removed from the school, but Mitchell‟s father said his disabled boy was „never the same‟ after the attack.

Jamey Rodemeyer, N.Y., boy, 14, killed himself this weekend after posting an online farewell.A student at Williamsville North High School, Jamey had been tormented for the past 12 months by cyberbullies who made disparaging comments with gay references on his Formspring account, a website that allows anonymous posts."JAMIE IS STUPID, GAY, FAT ANND [sic] UGLY. HE MUST DIE!" one post said, according to local reports.

Jamey Rodemeyer

Billy (William) Lucas, who was a student at Greensburg Community High School, was found hanging in a family owned barn.While reports say that Lucas made no reference to bullying in his suicide note, it has been suggested that he was the victim of a sustained campaign of bullying at the hands of some of his classmates. In particular, it is reported that he was subjected to taunts about his perceived sexual orientation and was called “fag” among other jibes. It should be noted that Billy never self-identified as being gay.

Billy (William) Lucas

The family of a 10-year-old girl in east central Illinois says intense bullying caused the fifth-grader to kill herself.Ashlynn Conner told her mom she was being bullied at Ridge Farm Elementary School, where she was an honor student. She was also being bullied in the neighborhood.But the girl‟s mother says she never expected her daughter would take her own life.

Ashlynn Conner

15-year-old Marjorie Raymond committed suicide after enduring years of abuse at her school in the Gaspe Peninsula. Her mother, Chantal Larose, told CTV Montreal that she only recently found out that Marjorie had been dealing with taunts and bullying since her first day at Gabrielle Le Courtois high school. Larose said Marjorie was very good at hiding her feelings, but had recently talked to her about the abuse and that she hated school. Larose said she had promised to pull her daughter out of school at the age of 16 and to send her to a technical adult institution. Marjorie killed herself. In a note, Marjorie blamed her suicide on "the jealous people in this world who only want to destroy happiness."

Marjorie Raymond

- It is estimated that 160,000 children miss school every day due to fear of attack or intimidation by other students. Source: National Education Association.- American schools harbor approximately 2.1 million bullies and 2.7 million of their victims. Dan Olweus, National School Safety Center.- 1 in 7 Students in Grades K-12 is either a bully or a victim of bullying.- 56% of students have personally witnessed some type of bullying at school.- 15% of all school absenteeism is directly related to fears of being bullied at school.- 71% of students report incidents of bullying as a problem at their school.- 1 out of 20 students has seen a student with a gun at school.- 282,000 students are physically attacked in secondary schools each month.- Those in the lower grades reported being in twice as many fights as those in the higher grades. However, there is a lower rate of serious violent crimes in the elementary level than in the middle or high schools.

Bullying percentages