Bullies Beware, Zero Bully is Here!

October has been designated Bullying Prevention month across the nation. Many schools have been holding workshops and discussions including teachers, students and parents on how to prevent the problem that seems to plague every school and neighborhood playground.

I am sure as long as mankind has been on earth there have been bullies. I remember when I was in fifth grade and the kids harassed very nerdy Roger Shobach for wearing high water pants. You know the kind that ended around one's ankles. I can still hear kids chanting; “ Where is the flood Roger?!” Luckily he just shrugged it off and it never went farther than that. Roger is probably the CEO of some huge corporation now, making millions and having the last laugh.  

It’s definitely a problem that is not going away anytime soon. That is why the first defense is to teach our kids at home, what is right and wrong behavior and how to react to those who attempt to push us around.

 What makes bullying more insidious today is technology. Cyber-bullying is now a new word in our everyday vernacular. Kids have been pushed around online with sometimes tragic results. Dennis Nagy a retired NJ police Chief and a friend of ours with 30 some years in law enforcement is all too familiar with the problem. Not too long ago in the news a 13 year old boy took his life after being bullied and tormented in school and on the internet. He was outraged and saddened when he read of it. “Why can’t we empower our kids and give them some sort of edge against this kind of bullying?” he thought.

Being the parent of teenage girls, Dennis was aware of the amount of time his children spent on the Internet and its importance in their lives. He also knew that his kids would never let him watch over their shoulder as they chatted online or complain to him if someone was harassing them for fear of having their Internet privileges curtailed. This led him to consider how children might safely report the problems they face everyday online without the stigma and the fear of “telling.” That is when the idea for Zero Bully came to him.

Dennis went to his friend Glenn Adamousky, a technology expert, who then developed the software for an online intervention program. Making it sophisticated but easy to use, kids can upload Zero Bully to their desktop or laptop computers and it is not activated until they click on the Zero Bully icon.  There they can capture any inappropriate or threatening content on their screen or report any threatening situations going on at school while remaining totally anonymous. This information is then sent to experienced screeners who are former law enforcement officers themselves, who then decide whether to notify the school administrators or police or both.

 Dennis went to another close friend of his, Joe Kovacs a retired school principal of 30 years, for his experience and expertise on the subject. Joe who is thrilled with the results of Zero Bully, observed “By working with your children to educate them to the dangers of the Internet and then encouraging them to take action by anonymously reporting threatening and possibly criminal communications they encounter on the Internet or in school with Zero Bully, you have empowered them to stand up for themselves.”

Zero Bully is currently being marketed to public and private schools and colleges who would provide access to Zero Bully on their designated school computers while also distributing it to all students for use at home.

To sum it up, Zero Bully is a sophisticated and unique computer based child safety product that through the interactions of children, parents, schools and police can effectively combat bullying, child predators and school threats anywhere. Bullies beware!

For more information visit the website at www.zerobullysquad.com or call directly at 732-504-8024.