Rocky View County (RVC) students and youth advocacy groups will be pink and proud Feb. 26, during the 14th annual Pink Shirt Day initiative.
The yearly movement has been promoting anti-bullying messages across Canada since 2007. According to pinkshirtday.ca, the initiative began in Berwick, N.S., when two high-school students bought and distributed 50 pink shirts to their classmates after a Grade-9 student was bullied for wearing pink during the first day of classes.
In RVC, the movement has grown to include initiatives undertaken by Rocky View Schools (RVS), local businesses, community associations and more.
“As a division, we collaborate with community partners to highlight and engage in these very important conversations all year long,” said Jodi Neetz, program manager for RVS’s Stepping Stones to Mental Health program, in a statement.
“Fostering learning environments that value student voice, opportunity, fairness, compassion, citizenship, choice and diversity is essential to students making a positive difference in their life, school, community and the world.”
RVS schools participating in Pink Shirt Day include RancheView School in Cochrane and École Edwards in Airdrie, whose students will attend the Calgary Hitmen’s Be Brave game Feb. 27 at the Scotiabank Saddledome in Calgary.
"We have been encouraging our whole community to come dressed in pink and gave families the opportunity to purchase T-shirts and toques and bracelets [at school]," said Sharon Cronin, Rancheview principal. "We had an excellent response and teachers are really talking it up, so we are confident that the school will be a sea of pink."
Neetz added it is everyone’s responsibility – students, staff and families – to stand up to bullying and discrimination.
“In our communities, it is important to teach and promote inclusion for all,” she said. “We invite individuals to wear pink [Feb. 26] and join RVS in raising awareness and showing their commitment to happy, healthy communities.”
For some local anti-bullying advocates, the message behind Pink Shirt Day extends beyond the date itself. In southeast RVC, Synergy Youth and Community Development Society’s YELL Youth Council has been busy all month with its annual Pretty in Pink campaign.
Members create and sell buttons – bearing anti-bullying messages – to businesses and groups in Chestermere, Langdon and surrounding rural areas throughout February. The buttons cost either $2 or $5, and can be found at many local businesses.
While certain steps have been taken to prevent bullying on a larger scale, such as the City of Chestermere’s new anti-bullying bylaw, YELL Youth Council member Josh Neiszner said it’s important to continue bringing awareness to the issue.
“It’s sad to say, but bullying will never stop – there will always be bullying, and there will always need to be [people] standing up to bullying,” he said.
Along with the button campaign, Pretty in Pink includes presentations from YELL Youth Council members at local schools in Chestermere and Langdon to spread the message. This year, according to Neiszner, assemblies will be held at Prairie Waters Elementary School, Sarah Thompson School and Our Lady of Wisdom School.
Neiszner, who has been involved with Synergy for seven years, said he’s come to truly enjoy the annual campaign.
“It’s fun going out and seeing all the students, interacting with them and helping them get through hard times in their life,” he said. “[It’s important to] start them thinking about this young, at the elementary-school level, so when they do go into middle school and high school, they know how to deal with bullying.”
Scott Strasser, AirdrieToday.com
Follow me on Twitter @scottstrasser19
