Yokota Middle School students, teachers and staff march against bullying at Yokota Air Base, Japan, Oct. 30, 2024. (Akifumi Ishikawa/Stars and Stripes)
YOKOTA AIR BASE, Japan — Sporting orange clothing and carrying signs, more than 100 middle-schoolers, staff and community members gathered this week to deliver an anti-bullying message at this airlift hub in western Tokyo.
Some signs were whimsical: “Donut bully,” read one with the image of an orange doughnut covered in white sprinkles. Others, more serious: “Let’s stand in unity.”
Yokota Middle School students, teachers and staff march against bullying at Yokota Air Base, Japan, Oct. 30, 2024. (Akifumi Ishikawa/Stars and Stripes)
Yokota Middle School students march against bullying at Yokota Air Base, Japan, Oct. 30, 2024. (Akifumi Ishikawa/Stars and Stripes)
“The anti-bullying walk was something we started last year in October because it’s anti-bullying month, and we wanted to bring everybody together and wear orange, which is the color that signifies anti-bullying,” Yokota Middle School principal Hilary Simmons told Stars and Stripes during the half-hour event on the track at nearby Yokota High.
“We want to bring awareness to the importance of being in a place that feels safe and that the kids feel valued,” she added.
Bullying is not very common at Yokota Middle School, said Simmons, who attributes that to being part of a military community. But bullying is a recognized problem in U.S. schools.
“You never know where our students are going to go next, so it’s important that the month’s events make it very apparent and bring a lot of awareness, so the kids can feel empowered to take a stance against bullying,” she said.
One in five U.S. students reported being bullied in some way during the 2016-17 school year, according to survey results released two years later by the Department of Education.
One in four eighth-graders reported being bullied, the most of any grade between sixth and 12th, the report states. In the Midwest one in four of all students reported being bullied, the highest percentage among four regions in the report.
Bullying can range from being excluded from activities to texted insults to being pushed or spit on, according to the report’s data.
Yokota Middle is one of many Department of Defense Education Activity schools that hosted events for Bullying Awareness Month. The message is not lost on the students.
“Anti-Bullying Month is important for our school because whenever new students are coming in and out, they need to feel welcome,” seventh-grader Macy Hawkins told Stars and Stripes after the walk.
Yokota Middle School students march against bullying at Yokota Air Base, Japan, Oct. 30, 2024. (Akifumi Ishikawa/Stars and Stripes)
Fellow seventh-grader Lelle Avellan said she’s happy to show support for such an important message.
“This makes me feel like my school actually cares and accepts people, and participating is actually really fun,” she said.
Several DODEA schools across the Pacific observed the World Day of Bullying Prevention on Oct. 7, Unity Day Against Bullying on Oct. 16 and held assemblies and spirit weeks throughout the month.
“I think it’s significantly important, especially at the middle and high school level, because sometimes students aren’t totally aware of what bullying looks and sounds like, so teaching them that can encourage the kids to really be advocates against bullying,” Simmons said.
National Bullying Awareness month was originally a weeklong event started in 2006 by the National Bullying Prevention Center. It was expanded in 2010 to include the entire month of October.
