NSU Horizons Fall 2011

7 horizons bystanders. “Those who are witnesses can take action to stop bullying instead of allowing bullying to take place.” Peer-to-peer techniques also are proving effective. NSU alumna Patricia Cabal created Speak Up!, a collaboration involving Broward area middle-school students, in which improvisational acting techniques explore the different aspects of bullying. Speak Up! was Cabal’s capstone project in 2009 for the Master of Science in Education with a specialization in Interdisciplinary Arts program, offered through what is now the Abraham S. Fischler School of Education. “As the children improvised, they noticed different choices had different outcomes, and that positive peer pressure was a key factor in help- ing a victim,” said Cabal. “This project has a future in school communities where students can use the arts to understand how to make a difference in their own schools.” The Weight of Words , a student- generated musical, was created in the drama department of Nova High School, and was seen by more than 3,000 students during a 2011 tour of Broward County schools. The musical grew from NSU’s ongoing partnership with the Broward Public School’s Office of Prevention, said David Spangler, Ph.D., program professor of the Fischler School’s M.S. in Education with a specialization in Interdisciplinary Arts program. Spangler is founder and president of the Lovewell Institute for the Creative Arts, an arts education program. The musical also benefited from work by Cheryl Duckworth, Ph.D., an assistant profes- sor at NSU’s Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences. “The students who wrote the play actually worked with NSU clinicians who knew the research. The students ended up adding musical numbers based on the clinician’s findings on the outcome of bullying situations,” added Spangler. Following the performances, the student cast hosted a question- and-answer session that gave the student audience an opportunity to speak candidly to people their own age rather than authority figures. “From this, we started a mentoring program. Bullying is happening at our school, and it’s happening elsewhere,” said Mary Levinson, community rela- tions liaison at Somerset Preparatory School in North Lauderdale, one of the schools where The Weight of Words was performed. Duckworth mainly works with teachers and students, both domestically and internationally. Administrators and education leaders also have joined her workshops. An expert in peace educa- tion, she also founded NSU’s Peace and Conflict Resolution Education Working Group. The course she teaches, Conflict Resolution for the School and School System, focuses on mediation and com- munity building and understanding the political and economic contexts in which schools operate. “We examine the kinds of conflict that schools deal with, including bully- ing, and what role the schools play in it,” said Duckworth. In the workplace Yet, bullying isn’t confined to the school setting. Workplace bullying is a specialty of Alexia Georgakopoulos, associate professor of conflict resolu- tion and communication at NSU’s