The Olweus Bullying Prevention Program or OBPP for short, is the most researched and probably best-known bullying prevention program available today. Developed by Dan Olweus of Norway, one of the co-authors of this guide, OBPP has over thirty-five years of research behind it and has been implemented throughout the world, in countries such as the United States, Canada, England, Mexico, Iceland, Germany, Sweden, and Croatia, in addition to Norway.
OBPP is recognized by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence as one of only eleven (at the time of publication) Blueprints Model Programs and by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) as a Model Program--two of the highest honors a prevention program can attain. It has also received numerous awards from other organizations dedicated to addressing the issue of bullying and violence among children.
The goals of the program are:
to reduce existing bullying problems among students
to prevent the development of new bullying problems
to achieve better peer relations at school
This Teacher's Guide, with accompanying DVD/CD-ROM, serves as the primary program implementation tool for teachers and other classroom support staff. It highlights the important role you will play both in the classroom and in schoolwide efforts in preventing and addressing bullying. All the resources you need to implement the program, except for the Olweus Bullying Questionnaire, are provided in this guide or on the accompanying DVD/CD-ROM.
Ideally, every teacher should have a copy of this guide. If this is not possible, we recommend that each Teacher Guide be shared among no more than three teachers.
