| Current data illustrate a growing incidence of bullying at the middle school level across the United States. Yet, understanding of prominent anti-bullying programs, such as the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program (OBPP), has been little researched in the scholarly literature. It was not known what and how the OBPP accounted for the incidents of reported bullying, as documented by written student discipline referrals at a middle school in West Texas. The purpose of this qualitative, exploratory case study was to identify and describe how the OBPP accounted for the incidents of bullying as documented by written student discipline referrals at a middle school in West Texas. The theoretical framework for this study was Bandura's social cognitive theory. A qualitative case study design was implemented, which achieved triangulation using an online questionnaire of 17 teachers, an online questionnaire of three administrators, interviews with two school counselors, and student archival data consisting of a bullying referral report and the Olweus Bullying Questionnaire data retrieved from the school district database for the school years 2011-2014. Results showed that bullying incidents increased over time, as did the propensity of students and staff to report such incidents and for administrators to sanction offenders. A lack of staff training to identify properly and report bullying and time and resources for administrators to investigate emerged as key themes. These findings will help scholars understand the dynamics of bullying in middle school and aid administrators in creating effective anti-bullying strategies. |
