Community Matters in the News
Click on the links below to access articles on Safe School Ambassadors and other Community Matters programs and services, as well as interviews of and editorials by Executive Director Rick Phillips.
‘Safe School Ambassadors’: Selected District 3 students trained to help stop bullying
Orangeburg, SC Consolidated School District Three is taking a proactive approach in tackling the issue of bullying in the schools by introducing the Safe School Ambassadors Program to train selected student leaders how to identify bullying and to “intervene non-violently.
How to change a culture of hazing in schools
Changing a culture of hazing in schools takes more than the mere adoption of anti-bullying policies or having students take pledges - it requires making the school environment not just physically but emotionally safer
Lincoln Jr. High takes fight against bullying into the community
Students from Lincoln Junior High in Taft, CA are taking the battle against bullying up another step, and, as Lincoln assistant principal Heather Ward told the District's Board of Education, it's starting to pay off.
Reed-Custer ambassadors listen, learn
115 students from grades 4 through 12 in the Reed-Custer Consolidated Union School District in Braidwood, Illinois, participated in a two-day, comprehensive training program to become Safe School Ambassadors.
Conference aims to stem bullying, tragedies
CM Executive Director Rick Phillips addressed the National Safety Response Conference, held in Las Vegas, NV on January 16 - 18, 2013 on the topic of "Creating Safe Schools from the Inside-Out".
Safe at School
Sebastopol-based nonprofit shows students how to create a culture of kindness at school.
Rick Phillips interviewed on WCIU-TV Chicago
CM Executive Director Rick Phillips is interviewed by Melissa Forman on WCIU-TV about the Safe School Ambassadors program and our work with schools in the Chicago area.
Urbana Middle School program empowers students to stop bullying
Urbana Middle School program making a difference with ‘Safe School Ambassadors’
Students Learning To Be Ambassadors Against Bullying
Students from five of Guam's secondary schools have been picked to become Safe School Ambassadors. The student ambassadors are being trained this week to not just talk about bullying and school violence but to put a stop to it by influencing their peers in a positive way.
Waking Up Courage
We can’t legislate this problem away. We can’t punish our children into being compassionate. The best solution is to wake up the courage of bystanders.
It’s time for students to stand up to bullies
Punishment sounds great, but it rarely stops the taunts, assaults and cyber-attacks. There's really only one thing that works. Students must speak out and stand up to their peers. That was the message at a daylong conference this week attended by school officials from San Francisco and the Bay Area.
Nothing to be done about bullying?
The new documentary “Bully” will be tough to watch, but Sebastopol's Rick Phillips is hoping teens and adults who see it won't trudge home feeling hopeless.
Tiny steps reap big change
“If not me, who? If not now, when?” That is the mantra of the Safe School Ambassadors.
Gov. Martin O’Malley to Urbana Middle School
At Urbana Middle School, the message is out: Bullying is not acceptable.
“Bullies Beware:” Safe School Ambassador Program
It's something no parent wants their child to go through, but it happens in schools every day.
HuffPost Greatest Person Of The Day: Rick Phillips
Everything we want –- higher graduation rates, less violence, cultural respect and diversity –- all of that will happen if we create a real community in the schools.
Healdsburg J.H.S. is Distinguished School
For the first time since 1990, Healdsburg Junior High has been named a California Distinguished School.
Parents Learn How to Talk About Bullying
From name-calling to cyber-bullies, Hermosa Beach parents and school officials have taken a first step toward addressing the social issue of bullying.
Straight Talk
I’d like to shout from the rooftops about the “Safe School Ambassadors” program.
Students receive anti-bullying training
This week 30 students spent two days in anti-bullying training.