EAST MILLCREEK -- While remembering the Columbine High School tragedy, students at Wasatch Junior High School joined students in Oklahoma, Colorado, Tennessee and Michigan in taking a pledge to keep taunting out of their school.
Thursday morning, students stood with arms raised as they recited the Columbine "I will pledge." They vowed to end teasing and harassment, stop swearing, become more kind, not hurt others with words or actions and eliminate prejudice. The pledge also says students should encourage others to act in similar ways.Third District Court Judge Sandra Peuler administered the 112-word oath. She explained an oath was a solemn promise that the school's 866 students were making between themselves and others to keep the school a safe place. Teachers, staff and PTSA representatives had already signed a large poster-sized pledge.
After taking the pledge in a schoolwide assembly, students returned to their home rooms to sign a copy of the pledge, which will be laminated and posted there.
The so-called "No-Taunting Pledge" started at a Tennessee high school. An American Studies class wrote it April 21, the morning after two students at Columbine High School killed 12 students, a teacher and themselves. The pledge has been distributed on the Internet and published by the National Education Association. Wasatch Junior High staff added "teasing" to fit the junior high context and a line about eliminating prejudice.
"This pledge means that we are trying harder not to hurt others emotionally," said Anita Kitchen, Wasatch Junior High's student body president. She said she has personally been more aware how actions and words might offend others.
Kitchen suggested that other Utah school students should take the pledge.
Principal Christine Huley said while hers has been a safe school without a record of violence, a staff member suggested the pledge to be proactive. Huley said that teasing is the No. 1 problem in the school, particularly between ninth-graders and seventh-graders. As she has talked to students she has encouraged ninth-graders to not repeat the abuse that ninth-graders gave to them when they first came to the school.
"All of us are part of the solution. We all can help. We don't want to wait until it happens here," Huley said.
Huley said other schools in the Skyline High School network have been encouraged to take the oath. Students at Eastwood, Oakridge, Upland Terrance and Morningside elementaries participated in a similar pledge program. By next year, Huley said all of the schools in the area, including Canyon Rim Elementary, Churchill Junior High and Skyline High School, will participate.
The Granite District schools are the first known schools in Utah to take the Columbine pledge. Salt Lake City schools during last month's ribbon week signed on to a national Student Pledge Against Gun Violence. Kids pledged to never bring a gun to school, never use a gun to settle a dispute, and they promised to use their influence to keep friends from doing so.
The oath ceremony followed a presentation by motivational speaker and champion skier Darol Wagstaff.
"You are at risk unless you take a risk," Wagstaff said. "You can fly if you try."