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District anti-bullying coordinator reports near-perfect HIB scores across district
Summary
The district's anti-bullying coordinator told the board that every Hanover Township School District school scored 76 out of 78 on the state's annual HIB self-assessment for the 2024–25 school year; the presentation described training, investigations, partnerships and plans to post results with the New Jersey Department of Education.
The District Anti-Bullying Coordinator told the Hanover Township School District board that each school in the district earned a score of 76 out of a possible 78 points on the annual harassment, intimidation and bullying (HIB) self-assessment for the 2024–25 school year.
The coordinator said the district uses an eight-element framework — including HIB programs and initiatives, staff training, curriculum, HIB personnel, incident reporting, investigation processes and transparency of reporting — to evaluate prevention and response systems at every school. "A 3 means the school exceeds state expectations," the coordinator said, explaining the scoring is 0–3 per item, with 78 the perfect score and 50 the minimum passing score.
Why it matters: The self-assessment is the district's internal check on whether schools are preventing and responding to bullying and whether procedures meet state requirements. The coordinator said the district has maintained consistent scores year to year, which she tied to longstanding systems: training, clearly defined roles, shared forms and school-based counselors who serve as anti-bullying specialists and investigators.
The coordinator described several prevention elements the district highlights: an early-year Week of Respect, character-education lessons woven into daily routines, student-led kindness campaigns and mentoring programs in the middle school, and empathy-focused lessons in elementary grades. She also described partnerships with community organizations — the transcript references "Barclays" and the D.A.R.E. program — as reinforcing messages outside the classroom.
On training and investigations, the coordinator said all employees and volunteers receive annual HIB training and students attend assemblies in the first one or two weeks of the school year; students sometimes take a short quiz to reinforce learning. She added that district investigation procedures meet state timelines and are intended to be thorough, consistent and transparent to families and the state. "We want to look into everything to just make sure that we're thorough and we go through the process," the coordinator said, adding that the approach prioritizes educational follow-ups as well as corrective measures.
Board member Mr. Skiff asked whether there is a single district HIB coordinator. The coordinator said the role is shared: she and Mr. Wassman were assigned the district anti-bullying coordinator responsibilities after a recent reorganization, and school counselors act as the anti-bullying specialists and investigators at the building level.
Mr. Skiff also asked whether standardized district forms or an online tracking system would help ensure consistency. The coordinator said the district developed "homegrown" paper forms and flowcharts when the law was implemented, has shared those forms with neighboring schools, and has evaluated a subscription tracking product the transcript names as "Hipster" but has not fully switched to an online platform.
On appeals and screening, Mr. Skiff noted he has observed few appeals, which he interpreted as evidence that investigations are being handled consistently. He described a deliberate board preference under the law to avoid an initial subjective screening that would block investigations: "We'd rather have 30 non-confirmed HIBs than 1 investigation that's confirmed and a bunch that were deemed not worthy of investigation," he said, arguing for investigating more reports rather than dismissing them. The coordinator agreed, acknowledging that the broader approach requires more staff time but said it ensures fairness and that everyone is heard.
The coordinator closed by saying that, once the board approves the assessment, the district will submit the scores to the New Jersey Department of Education and post them on the district website. She thanked anti-bullying specialists, counselors, administrators, teachers and support staff for their work.
What the board will do next: The coordinator indicated the report requires board approval before submission to the state; no vote or formal motion was recorded during this presentation.
