Imagine yourself in school, walking to class in the hallways; students laughing at you, so-called "friends" pushing you into walls and lockers. Imagine people publicly degrading you on social networking websites, threatening, teasing and belittling you. You may begin to suffer physically - sick to your stomach, headaches, sleeplessness, and emotionally meanwhile those bullies do not suffer at all. All they get is a simple suspension despite how many times they may have bullied others. Bullying threatens the safety of students and affects the students' mental state of mind. Bullies should not receive the same consequences over and over again if they continue to bully others. Therefore, school administrators should institute harsher punishments to bullies.
Safety is a crucial priority for all students in schools. Students should be in a safe environment to learn, study, and to have a mind set to go to school every day. However, bullying prevents this from happening. According to the April 2013 bullying statistics, about 160,000 students stay home every day, across the nation, due to the fact that they don't feel safe at school as a result of bullying. Students who witness bullying often feel threatened everyday going to school even if they are not the target of bullying. They realize that their safety has been threatened. They realize that after multiple occurrences that the bullies will not learn from their wrongs. The safety of students is especially threatened when the victims decide to go to extreme measures and handle matters in their own hands. The Chardon High School shooting is a great example of an adolescent who couldn't deal with bullying and had taken matters in his own hand which resulted in endangering the safety of all the students. .
Another hazard of bullying is the instability of students' mental state of mind. When a student has been bullied, they tend to think less of themselves.