Thank you for writing the article last week on bullying. If you could also pass the message along to Alex too for having the courage to tell his story in the article. I thank him too so much. The problem is much larger than people want to admit. When my daughter was in 7th grade at Kirkland Junior High, she was verbally abused by the “girl” school bully who was half her size. My daughter is a huge teddy bear and can be taken advantage of because of her kind heart. The girl in this case had all six classes with my daughter and tormented her everyday … you are fat, ugly, stupid, dorky, loser, and would steal supplies and gum out of her backpack. We tried the whole first half of the year to kill her with kindness … did not work. I was just waiting until second semester when her classes would change. But she had all six classes with her again. I went to the principle and was told “sorry can’t do anything about it unless your daughter tells on her.” I find it hard to believe they can’t bring a student in and just say “your behavior has been brought to a parent’s attention.” That was all I really wanted is for her to know that someone is watching her closer. When I couldn’t get my daughter to tell on her the principle told me I can change all her classes. We did not change her classes and I e-mailed all the teachers who were great. Unfortunately, I had to tell my daughter she has to stick up for herself. I know now (but did not know at the time) this girl has always been a problem student who had a drug counselor at that point already. So why are they protecting the bully. I understand that at some point my daughter has to set boundaries, but because it was not physical abuse does not mean those words don’t stick. She said some horrible things, and the system did nothing to protect her. If my daughter at all was emotionally unstable that can be a bad situation. She is fine but the system definitely failed us. She now goes to Newport High School in Bellevue where my ex-husband lives and this was one of the reasons why. KJH students do not have enough discipline in my opinion. They get away with way too much talking back to teachers and adult peers. I think the question that needs to be asked is “What is this bullying program even doing?”

Jennifer Wright, Kirkland