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Superintendent battles what parents call ‘underlying bullying issue’

ANDERSON, Ind. (WISH) — The Anderson community was shocked when a 12-year-old boy took his own life last week. 

Superintendent Tim Smith with the Anderson Community School Corp. told News 8 he has heard from many parents who are blaming the district for what they say is an underlying bullying problem. Those parents believe officials aren’t doing enough to fix it. 

Smith said that’s not the case.

In fact, Smith said, the district just broke up a potential suicide pact last week. A separate incident spurred the pact, he said. He said it happened last Wednesday, when a young student was sent to the hospital for “self-harming.” 

Smith said the potential suicide pact sent district officials scrambling to make sure all students were OK. The district learned of the potential pact involving “multiple kids” from a nurse who treated a student at a hospital.

“We immediately had people on our way to the hospital, alerted the buildings, alerted all the staff so they kept track of all the kids in their building to make sure all our kids were safe,” Smith said. 

The district learned of the pact Feb. 20, two days after the 12-year-old boy committed suicide. He was a sixth-grader at Highland Middle School in Anderson. 

Smith said he knows parents are asking questions and want answers about resources the school has for mental health. 

“We are doing many things that go unnoticed sometimes. We have numerous reporting options for children if they are in harms way or if they feel like they are being bullied,” the superintendent said. 

Smith said the district has life coaches and counselors on hand to help. But, sometimes, Smith said, the hardest part is what he can’t tell parents when it comes to keeping bullying at bay and kids safe. 

“It becomes kind of a personnel type issue where we cannot divuldge to family members how we discipline other students. We (also) don’t talk about their children to other families, and we can’t talk about other families’ children to them. But, we do have records that we look at ourselves,” Smith said. 

The superintendent said although school officials cannot discuss specific cases, the district wants to keep the conversation going on bullying and mental health.

The district will have a community forum at 6 p.m. March 6 at Anderson High School. Smith said the district had planned to have a staff meeting Tuesday night, but, through some miscommunication, parents wanted to get involved and bring their concerns about the issue. Once the district realized how many parents were there, they created the new meeting to continue the conversation.

Anyone facing issues of suicide can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255. The group can also provide help on people facing bullying issues. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services also has information on bullying.