JALSA’s testimony before the Joint Education Committee indicates our concern for the long-term effects of bullying and the need for schools to be prepared to intervene.   Bullying creates a hostile and unwelcoming atmosphere in schools, which is not the arena in which we want our kids to learn.   The bullying is bad for the victim; it is bad for the bully, and it is bad for the schools.  Schools which deal with bullying report improved academic learning for all.   We are concerned about LGBT kids as well as those that get harassed for wearing a kippah or a prayer shawl, or because someone else perceives them as different.

Responding to Brian Camenker’s testimony that such legislation reflected special interest groups and a hidden agenda, Sheila Decter, indicated that JALSA was proud to consider itself a special interest group, as noted on this website:    Our special interest is promoting the general welfare; safeguarding access to equal opportunity; and eliminating the legal, societal and economic barriers that stand between too many and the promise of the American dream. We are a membership organization that believes that education is an important basic right.   If that agenda feels like a conspiracy, then it is a conspiracy of a lot of groups that care about the success of every school child.