"It's just kid stuff!" Fortunately, statements like this, which have served to justify inadmissible situations of bullying, are increasingly a thing of the past. However, that does not prevent bullying from continuing to be a serious problem in our society. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), between January 2021 and February 2022, 11,229 cases were detected in our country, which unfortunately is today one of the countries with the highest incidence of bullying in all of Europe.
The unit in Catalonia specialized in this field has managed, since its creation in mid-2021, more than 1,500 interventions and in this course it has already registered more than 400 cases. Identifying the appearance of bullying is not usually easy for teachers or families, because it is often suffered in silence.
All this causes a feeling of helplessness in the victim that can even lead to tragic situations. It is estimated that bullying today affects between 20 and 25% of the student population, especially in the last years of primary and secondary school. The percentage shoots up in groups such as students with high abilities, ADHD, autism or Asperger.
Currently, there is no specific training or clear protocols for detection or action in bullying situations. That is why it is increasingly important that parents, teachers, adolescents and children have the appropriate tools that allow them to get involved in the fight against this social scourge.
Brands can also play a fundamental role in this. Cola Cao knows it well. Through the ColaCao Foundation, it has launched the educational initiative Educating against bullying. This online platform with audiovisual content aimed at fathers and mothers, provides keys and useful tools to educate children in self-confidence, empowerment and the prevention of abusive situations.
On May 2, International Day Against Bullying, the ColaCao Foundation launched the website educandocontraelbullying.com, where we find interactive content that invites us to reflect, through everyday situations, on the dynamics of communication with children. , and to learn more about the dynamics of bullying. In the videos we can listen to valuable testimonials from fathers and mothers, as well as contributions from experts such as the pediatrician Lucía Galán (also known as Lucía Mi Pediatra) or the psychologists Rafa Guerrero and Claudia Pradas.
No one is potentially exempt from suffering bullying. For this reason, the testimonies and reflections of well-known people can be an effective means of making visible a problem that extends to all layers of society. Thus, the journalist Sara Carbonero shows her impressions as a mother concerned about the advance of bullying.
Also a journalist, Carme Chaparro, offers her harsh testimony as a victim of these practices in childhood. The former professional boxer Jero García, for his part, offers the other side of the coin: that of someone who, without even being aware of it, was a bully in childhood and who now helps young people to leave these attitudes behind.
So that we are aware of the impact that bullying has on children and adolescents, Chaparro does not hesitate to affirm: "I believe that today I am alive because then there were no social networks." The actress Yolanda Ramos was also a victim of bullying in her school years. For her, joining this project is something that "I owe to the young Yolanda and to all the boys and girls who are having a hard time now."
As Galán explains, "victims often lose interest in everything they were passionate about before." For this reason, if they stop "going out with their usual friends and prefer to stay at home", they suddenly lose interest in their studies, which causes a sharp drop in their grades, or, on the contrary, they decide to fully immerse themselves in them, it is logical to wonder what could be happening. Communication with children is therefore essential. Carbonero explains that, "through the game of choosing what was the best and the worst of the day, I managed to get them to tell me that something was happening in class."
The contents of the Fundaicón ColaCao offer multiple points of view. Of course, they approach the problem of bullying from the perspective of the victims, but also from that of the witnesses – who observe what is happening without letting the adults know about it – or even from the bullies' perspective.
Every week a new video will be released that will delve into topics such as the warning signs that one must know how to perceive, cyberbullying, the consequences that bullying can leave in adult life, the importance of self-esteem or the various forms of empowerment.
As Javier Coromina, a member of the ColaCao Foundation board of trustees, has pointed out, with this initiative, they seek to stand "at the side of fathers and mothers, and help them, giving them tools and keys to educate their children against bullying." The objective is to provide content that provides rigor and quality and serves to shed hope and find solutions to difficult situations: “We are aware that there is a lot of noise around these issues. Families tell us that they need light amid so much uncertainty”, adds Coromina.
The project has had the advice of the NACE association (No to School Bullying), made up of psychologists, lawyers, teachers and other specialized profiles, which has been dedicated to the prevention and intervention in processes of school bullying for more than 10 years, as well as in the support and attention to the victims and their families in a free and disinterested way.
The aforementioned Galán, Pradas and Guerrero (the latter, a psychologist specialized in education and in child and adolescent brain) will be in charge of providing tools and information to address situations related to bullying in content that will be published weekly, and free of charge, on the project website, as well as on the social networks of ColaCao and Fundación ColaCao.
