Denver ABC Channel 7 Names BRRC as “7 Every Day Hero” – April 2, 2023

Denver ABC Channel 7 Names BRRC as “7 Every Day Hero” – April 2, 2023

 
Author: Kevin S. Krug

DENVER, Colorado —

DENVER – Tom and Dru Ahlborg didn’t set out to become experts in bullying, but when their son was relentlessly bullied in middle school they found themselves in the middle of a crash course on the topic.

“When you feel powerless, and your child is, you know, suicidal or whatever, you are just — you’re doing anything,” Tom said.

Tom and Dru Ahlborg founded the Bullying Recovery Resource Center in 2018. Since then, they’ve built upon the expertise they gained on their own to help children and families who need a voice in their corner who believes in them.

“We teach them how to talk about bullying,” Dru said. “There’s a different language we want to use. The child is not a victim. They’re a target.”

With the aid of a team of experienced volunteers, BRRC provides the things families need. Anything from information and support, to advocates to help them work on solutions with their child’s school.

BRRC has helped dozens of families over the years, and while they have seen an uptick in violent bullying recently, they say physical bullying isn’t the only challenge families are facing.

“There’s a lot of shunning and gossip and things like that,” Dru said. “That can be just as harmful as any other kind of bullying.”

  • To learn more about the programs offered by the Bullying Recovery Resource Center, including how you can help, click here. BRRC does have a golf fundraiser coming up on April 22. Click here for information.
  • If you or someone you know is in distress, call the Suicide & Crisis Hotline by clicking here or dialing 988.
  • Safe2Tell takes reports from students or others concerned about their safety. Click here for information.

“The other way that we have seen that is where Safe2Tell was notified about a child that’s gonna bring a gun. And that’s the bullied kid and they’re visited at like 2 a.m. in the morning,” Tom added.

And while the Ahlborgs are trying to change the way schools handle incidences of bullying, their bigger goal is much more defined: Be there for kids in need so they don’t attempt suicide.

“If that child knows that they’re being protected, they’re heard, we’re going to find a solution to get them safe,” Dru said.

Read the story and watch the video on the Channel 7 website.

 
Family files lawsuit against District 51 after son’s bullying

Family files lawsuit against District 51 after son’s bullying

Photo used with permission from The Grand Junction Sentinel: From left: Nathan Harford, Amber Harford, Igor Raykin and Tom Ahlborg.

 

 
Author: Nathan Deal

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. —

A Grand Junction family recently filed a civil lawsuit against Mesa County Valley School District 51, alleging that the district failed to protect their child from consistent abuse and bullying in school.

Amber and Nathan Harford, with the assistance of anti-bullying advocacy group Bullying Recovery Resource Center, sent a Gebser Letter — a letter that formally notifies a school or district about allegations of bullying — to the district in December 2020, detailing abuses against their child while they were enrolled at Orchard Mesa Middle School.

The letter included incidents reported to Orchard Mesa Middle School and District 51 from the fall 2018 to fall 2020 semesters, including an incident in which the child was hit 27 times in the head by a fellow student while a group of students filmed the assault, an incident that Bullying Recovery Resource Center Chairman Tom Ahlborg said has still left the child’s face partially paralyzed because of bell’s palsy.

“He’s been ruthlessly targeted. He hasn’t been in school for two years,” Ahlborg told The Daily Sentinel. “He’s been going to online school, but he’s never been back in-person to school, not because of the pandemic but because school’s just not safe for him. Obviously, a developmentally disabled kid or special-needs kid doesn’t thrive with online learning. However, there’s not really been a lot of options for the district.”

Because of that alleged lack of options from the district and a general sentiment that the district hasn’t prioritized their concerns, the Harfords at the start of September filed a lawsuit against District 51 under the Claire Davis School Safety Act, which waives a school or district’s sovereign immunity if it failed to provide “reasonable care” for students who are victims of murder, violence or sexual assault.

The law is named after an Arapahoe High School student who was shot and killed at the school in 2013 by a fellow student.

“We’ve been trying to work with the School District and we’ve just gotten nowhere as far as their accountability,” Ahlborg said. “For so long, they wouldn’t even offer protection to this kid. They were just trying to force him back into school…. The school district has just dragged their feet, so finally, this is a lawsuit that’s been filed against them.”

District 51 provided the following statement to The Daily Sentinel:

“Mesa County Valley School District 51 takes the safety and security of our students and staff extremely seriously. We are aware of the lawsuit that has been filed and we will vigorously defend the allegations that have been made, in a court of law.”

The Bullying Recovery Resource Center, partnering with the Montrose-based organization PEER Kindness, spearheaded efforts to get the state to expand its anti-bullying laws in the past few years. Gov. Jared Polis signed Jack and Cait’s Law into effect in June 2021.

Jack and Cait’s Law requires the Colorado Department of Education to use a stakeholder process when updating its policy for bullying prevention. The process must include parents of students who were subjected to bullying. This policy clearly identifies the difference between a conflict and bullying, as well as harassment and bullying. The law also clarifies the role of cyberbullying during online instruction, whether off or on school property.

The law was named after two students in Colorado who died by suicide: Montrose’s Caitlyn Haynes in 2015 and Cherry Creek’s Jack Padilla in 2019. Haynes’ parents founded PEER Kindness shortly after their daughter’s death and Padilla’s father sits on the Bullying Recovery Resource Center Board of Directors.

For Ahlborg, the best way to honor these parents and their children’s legacies is to use the legislation their deaths inspired to hold school districts accountable when students’ cries of bullying are seemingly going unheard.

Ahlborg said that his organization is going to be involved in lawsuits against other districts, but this lawsuit against District 51 is the Bullying Recovery Resource Center’s first major civil suit involvement “because it’s so horrifying what’s happened to this young man.”

“Now is the time for these types of lawsuits to happen. Now’s the time because bullying is just out of control in schools,” Ahlborg said. “After Jack and Cait’s Law was just put in that schools are now supposed to investigate bullying and are required to ask about the imbalance of power and investigate whether that’s apparent… now is the time to really get school districts’ attention to properly investigate bullying so they don’t end up in Mesa County School District 51’s shoes.”

 

Read the story on the Sentinel website.

 
BRRC sues District 51 for negligence following severe beating

BRRC sues District 51 for negligence following severe beating

Photo used with permission from The Grand Junction Sentinel: From left:  Igor Raykin and Tom Ahlborg.

 

Watch the video here

By KKCO Staff

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (KKCO) – Two years ago, video of an altercation between two students at Orchard Mesa Middle School surfaced on social media. The video shows one student repeatedly punching a special needs student in the face. Now, two years later, the student’s parents are suing District 51 with the help of Bullying Recovery Resource Center, a Denver-based advocacy group.

The student and the family’s names have been omitted for the safety of the student.

The suit alleges that the school failed to protect a disabled student— which the suit argues is something schools are legally required to do. A letter sent to the district on Nov. 5, 2020 details approximately 30 instances of bullying over a period of two and a half years, and the frequent urging from both the parents and BRRC to take some form of preventative measures.

District 51 issued the following statement on the suit:

“Mesa County Valley School District 51 takes the safety and security of our students and staff extremely seriously. We are aware of the lawsuit that has been filed and we will vigorously defend the allegations that have been made, in a court of law.”

The victim of the assault sustained permanent injuries, including partial facial paralysis and disfiguring scarring, and the child’s parents say that they aren’t willing to send him back to school without his safety guaranteed.

The family’s attorney, Igor Raykin, said that they have repeatedly asked the school for a safety plan, but the school hasn’t followed through on that or a number of other responsibilities. “We not only haven’t received a safety plan, but we haven’t received a special education plan from them for a long time as well. It’s up to them to know what’s going on with this child, but they’ve basically given up on that responsibility,” said Raykin.

“When we tried to help not just with the bullying, it was really identified that there was a denial of [Free Appropriate Public Education] going on prior to this with this child as well, because the evaluations they were conducting for this child was with a school nurse.” said Tom Ahlborg, Chairman and Director of BRRC. “The child suffers from some significant developmental disabilities. It’s a genetic condition. That is something that really goes beyond the scope [of a school nurse.]”

Ahlborg said that the school refused to consult experts about the child’s condition. When they requested an independent educational evaluation, Ahlborg says the school pushed back and claimed that they had to use school nurses. “It took us going out and raising the money, we actually paid for it,” said Ahlborg. “Because the school was really denying that this child needed an evaluation. Obviously, when it came back, he needed that evaluation.”

“We have represented numerous special needs students over the years against this district. I don’t know how else to put this, except to say that this district almost functions as an enemy of special needs kids,” said Raykin. “I have never seen so much outright hostility against special needs kids as I have from this district.”

 

 

 
Bullying Legislation in Colorado – The Time is Now

Bullying Legislation in Colorado – The Time is Now

Most experts will agree that bullying that occurs in schools is at an epidemic level. According to www.stopbullying.gov, between 1 in 4 and 1 in 3 U.S. students say they have been bullied at school. There is a litany of research telling us that a child who has been bullied not only struggles while the bullying occurs, but it can also lead to complications later in life.

Probably the most frightening outcome of bullying is a child taking their life. It is not uncommon. I have met a number of these heartbroken parents. It is not fair to say that bullying causes a child to choose suicide however there are compelling statistics that should be mentioned.

  • Nearly one-quarter of tenth graders who reported being bullied also reported having made a suicide attempt in the past 12 months, according to a Washington State Healthy Youth Survey.
  • Half of the 12th graders who reported being bullied also reported feeling sad and hopeless almost every day for two weeks in a row, according to the Washington State Healthy Youth Survey.
  • Among 15- to 24-year-olds, suicide is one of the leading causes of death, according to Suicide Awareness Voices for Education. Additionally, 16 percent of students consider suicide; 13 percent create a plan; and 8 percent have made a serious attempt.
  • Cyberbullying caused kids to consider suicide more than traditional bullying according to a study in JAMA Pediatrics

Furthermore, the statistics about youth suicide in Colorado paint an alarming picture. According to the September 17, 2019 CPR News, the following statements are worth noting.

  • The rate of teen suicide in Colorado has increased by 58% in the last three years making it the cause of 1 in 5 adolescent deaths.
  • Colorado has the highest increase in the teen suicide rate in the US since 2016.
  • In the past three years, teen suicide in Colorado rose from 12.9 to 20.4 deaths per 100,000 adolescents ages 15-19.

With these things in mind, Bullying Recovery Resource Center and Rick Padilla have joined forces with other concerned parties to propose “Jack’s Law.” Jack Padilla was a freshman at Cherry Creek High School when he died by suicide on February 14, 2019 where bullying was a contributing factor.

Rick formed JackStrong and is taking a stand against bullying and teen suicide. We are honored to be working side by side with such a courageous advocate of teen mental health.

We cannot continue to allow so many of our Colorado youth to be relentlessly bullied and to contemplate and commit suicide. It is time to put some real foundations in place in Colorado to help protect our youth. The following is our desired outcomes that we are proposing to Colorado State Representative Lisa Cutter who desires to be the sponsor of the bill (lisa.cutter.house@state.co.us, 303-866-2582):

  • Schools would be required (not just “encouraged) to create policy that elevates bullying complaints and investigations to the same existing timelines, standards, due process, internal appeal procedures as complaints of discrimination or harassment.
  • Intentional false reports of bullying shall constitute bullying.
  • An anti-bullying team must be established, and it must include at least 2 parents and an external anti-bullying expert.
  • Parents of students involved in a bullying incident would be entitled to receive a written finding about the requisite investigation, and the school shall affirmatively outreach to and meet with the bullying victim and his/her parents within 20 school days to confirm that the bullying has ceased.
  • When a school learns that a student is the alleged victim of bullying, the school must immediately assess whether the student is at risk of self-harm and provide appropriate resources to the bullied child.
  • Parents shall have the right to appeal the School District’s decision related to bullying findings to the Colorado Department of Education.
  • Bullying directed toward a victim under age 18 with the intent to provoke suicide or self-harm would be considered a criminal offense.

The time is now. Our children and their families deserve fundamental laws in place to protect children who are targets of bullying. These proposals will not stop bullying; however, they will give parents and targeted children the attention they need and deserve. This law will help provide more transparency and methods of dealing with
bullying.

Parents, students accuse Douglas County School District coaches of bullying

Parents, students accuse Douglas County School District coaches of bullying

Author: Michael Konopasek

 

 
 
DOUGLAS COUNTY, Colo. — On Tuesday, the Douglas County School Board heard allegations that girls in four athletic programs  from three different high schools were bullied by their coaches. Bullying Recovery Resource Center was there and says the families from Douglas County, Chaparral and Rock Canyon high schools have had enough. Read the full story.
 
For some kids, going back to school triggers fears of bullying

For some kids, going back to school triggers fears of bullying

 

Author: Allison Levine

BRRC was featured on the morning 9News segments on Friday, August 16.  We were excited and honored to be spotlighted as they delved into returning back to school and bullying.  Please check it out and share as you like.