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12/19 - 12/23 - Longmeadow High School stands together to defeat bullying.
Visit the Stand Together web site. You will find thousands of people holding a sign like this indicating their pledge number too.
I really need to clean up and
retake my photo, mine looks
like a mugshot.
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"Stand Together" Longmeadow High School Students to Take a Stand Against Bullying!
Are you wondering why I chose the topic of Bullying for my Holiday blog? How is this relevant?? December is the time of year, that I become lackadaisical. There is so much going on in our lives...shopping, and I can barely wait for my vacation next week! My friends are planning holiday parties and thinking about the tasty treats they may bake or eat. For weeks on end, my girls are talking bout the gifts they hope to receive.
Preparing for my New Years resolution is a much deserved mental time out. I can now finally take a breath, pat my self on the back and then challenge myself to do better for the upcoming year.
Students in Peer Leadership Class, Community Service Class, and Unity Club.
The most important thing we do around the holidays is spend time with our loved ones! This brings me back around full circle to a trajedy in 2009 when Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover an 11-year-old boy from Springfield, MA, died by suicide after experiencing bullying.
We must not forget that children are innocent, delicate and impressionable.
In repsonse to this trajedy GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network), the leading national education organization focused on ensuring safe schools for all students worked with Extreme Makeover: Home Edition to bring the community of Springfield, Massachusetts together, to create awareness of bullying and to help give a fresh start to the Walker family.
From this tragedy spawned a fantastic anti-bullying awareness campaign called "Stand Together", over 148,997 supporters (that I know of); a superb cross-media marketing campaign to aid with data collection and marketing automation activities and countless schools and organizations are taking their stand against bullying right now!
Ok, I'm guilty. I don't watch Extreme Home Makeover (I'm more of a Fringe guy on a Friday night). The "Stand Together" initiative was not on my radar until my wife (a huge fan of the TV show) asked me to donate design work and printing work to her school for an event they were having on Anti-Bullying. Of course, I'm always delighted to help her and LHS!
Megan Schwartz is a History Chair at Longmeadow High School, in Longmeadow, MA (a neighboring town of Springfield) and teaches a Community Service Learning class at Longmeadow High School. Throughout the year, Megan and her students support many non-profit organizations.
Beginning Monday, December 19, 2011 through Friday, December 23, 2011, Longmeadow High School will, take a stand together to defeat bullying. The campaign spearheaded by student Mollie Posnik, with the support Megan Schwartz - Community Service Learning, Shelly Warren and Meaghan Roy - Peer Leadership Teachers, and Sandy McDonald, advisor of the Unity Club will be working together to take pledges from the remaining LHS population of students.
High-Tech Approach:
- To aid the students record their pledge, they will use Apple Ipads to visit http://www.standtogether.tv
- Once the student has submitted their pledge, they're instructed to download a PDF document with their pledge number over the words "Stand Together".
- This document is then printed and the students photo is shot with their pledge number.
- The Ipads are then used to upload the photo to the Stand Together website.
- Each student will become a part of the more than 148,997 (that's my pledge number) people nationwide who have taken this pledge to stand together against bullying before them.
I never gave much thought to bullying before now...
Really, the thought of bullying never crossed my mind as a problem for children. Only after "Stand Together" did I really start thinking about this topic. As a child there were a few people I felt threatened by growing up, but I could avoid face to face encounters.
As marketers, we know that our target audiences are more receptive to multi-channel, marketing than marketing to only one channel at a time. We know that personalized, 1:1 marketing resonates better with consumers than static communications.
Text messaging, e-mail, chat rooms, online games and person to person encounters. Surely if a bully were to exploit many of these channels at the same time a child would feel like this is a relentless attack!
The world of communication has changed. If someone were to post a negative remark about me on Facebook, I would be caught off guard. Imagine how a child would internalize this. I understand now!!
Moving into 2012 I hope that included in all of our New Years Resolutions will be the thought of standing together to defeat bullying through awareness.
Thank you Longmeadow High School for helping to create awareness in our community!
GLSEN and Sirdeaner Walker this is a brilliant campaign!
Very Best and Happy New Year!
Zachary Schwartz
CEO - Fusion Cross-Media
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