A case study of an accountability conference as one strategy to address school bullying

This study utilises the age-old strategy of community conferencing in a case study design to evaluate the effectiveness of using the strategy to reduce school bullying. The community conferencing strategy is founded on the assumption that an individual's emotions are the most effective regulator of his/her behaviour(s).

The literature review describes how community conferencing has been used in various contexts in the past and how it is currently used by such organisations as the Queensland Juvenile Justice Department. In the case study, a community conference was conducted with a student bully, his family, peers, the victim and his family, and relevant other educational authorities. The offending student had been previously excluded from school for a period of eighteen months and was in the re-entry phase when another bullying incident occurred. It was at this stage that the education authorities decided to use community conferencing as a means of reducing the reoccurrence of the bullying behaviour in this particular student.

In the case study design, multiple data types were used to gather as much data from as many sources as possible that related to the case. Short, relaxed, semi -structured interviews were conducted with the victim, offender supporters, and neutral education authorities. Observations of the conference were recorded unobtrusively by a third party. Various official records of the conference were kept and analysed. Finally a participant' satisfaction questionnaire was completed by those who took part.

Findings of the study revealed that four months after the conference the victim felt that the conference made a positive difference to how safe and supported he feels at school. The victim also reported that the bully's behaviour toward him had improved and he reported that he had more confidence to handle a similar situation should another arise in the future. The present study recommends that some changes be made to the community conference procedure but that generally conferencing should be included in the range of strategies used by schools in their anti -bullying policies.