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| 6/6/2009 | Email this article • Print this article | "The Web sites that are out there now have become a problem for us in the school district. This comes up often, and nine times out of 10 it does boil down to something said on a blog."
- Thomas Perillo,
Greater Amsterdam School District
superintendent
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District looking at video posted by AHS students
‘Cyberbullying’ the focus of investigation by GASD
Jessica Maher
Reporter
Officials from the Greater Amsterdam School District took action this week against an act of alleged cyberbullying at the Amsterdam High School.
"We're doing a full investigation of how that incident occurred," said Superintendent Thomas Perillo.
A parent in the district notified Perillo on Wednesday of a video, which was posted on YouTube and then to the local blog, "Upstream," which is run by Dan Weaver, as well as a fake MySpace account that was created in jest of the student. The video, which was later removed by YouTube, featured the male student being verbally harassed. Though there was no physical abuse, the video was profane and especially disturbing because it took place in the school, said Perillo.
"The more investigating we're doing, the more I'm finding out how small video devices can be," he said.
What the students used to film the bullying, how many students were involved and when the incident took place are all part of the ongoing investigation, which is hoped to be completed by Monday.
"We're trying to get as clear a picture as we can as to just what happened," said AHS Principal David Ziskin.
Since Thursday, the superintendent and AHS administrators have been going over the tape and calling in students and their parents. Both Perillo and Ziskin declined to comment on the number of students involved, or how many parents had been called in, until the investigation is complete.
"We're not sure if it was done as a joke," said Perillo. "But we're taking it most seriously."
On Friday, one AHS student, who asked to not be identified, said she'd heard the victim in the video and MySpace page knew what was going on the entire time.
When the investigation is complete, consequences for those students involved may range from detention to in or out of school suspension. And with the end of the school year mere weeks away, Perillo said time will be scheduled for mandatory bullying assemblies of some type, possibly involving outside counselors and psychologists.
"It's important that students learn from a very disturbing incident," said Ziskin.
While Ziskin said he's encountered bullying before as an administrator, this is the first incident of cyberbullying he's seen. When Perillo was principal at Wilbur H. Lynch Literacy Academy, he ran into varieties cyberbullying, specifically on networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.
"The Web sites that are out there now have become a problem for us in the school district," said Perillo. "This comes up often, and nine times out of 10 it does boil down to something said on a blog."
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Contact Jessica Maher at jessica.maher@recordernews.com.
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