A joint project with

The Feathers Against Bullying Project will involve students from across the

Toronto Catholic District School Board, along with educators, families and the broader community.

Instructions for Schools

Sixty thousand paper feathers will be distributed to schools

across our school board.

The paper feather becomes the means

by which we, the TCDSB community,

can promote our Gospel values

and our commitment to being an UPSTANDER,

not a bystanderwhen it comes to bullying

behaviour.

Schools received a package of individually-numbered paper feathers

at the Safe Schools Bullying Symposium.

The specific number sequence of your school’s feathers

has been recorded.

These paper feathers should be distributed to the students in your school.

If there are extra feathers, they may be given to staff, community members, etc., as desired.

If your school did not receivesufficient feathers for all students…

some students may be paired, each designing one side of the feather,

staff and families may add multiple statements or signatures to a single feather,

or your school may develop a creative solution of its own.

Each person should carefully record the number of his/her feather in order to view the feather online at a later date.

A tracking sheet, which may be copied as needed, is included in your package.

A digital picture of each completed feather will be taken and then uploaded to a web-site.

If more than one side of a feather is completed, a picture of both sides will be uploaded under the identification number.

You will be able to go to this web-site, enter your unique identification number

and view your feather, as well as feathers created by others.

Each paper feather is extremely important

as the count is essential for submission to Guinness World Records.

Please ensure that each of your school feathers is completed and returned.

Completing the feathers

Each feather should contain either:

a personal commitment to being an UPSTANDER, rather than a bystander when bullying behaviour occursor

a message of hope

Teachers may wish to review what it means to be an UPSTANDER as well as the safe and confidential

reporting systems specific to your school.

Each paper feather presents the opportunity

for individual expression.

The message may be communicated as:

a statement

a drawing or painting

expressive or abstract art

a story or a poem

When all of the feathers have been completed, they should be gathered together to await pick-up beginning

December 10th, 2012.

Schools will be notified of their specific pick- up date.

Over the next few months, each of the 60,000 feathers will be attached to the wire framework of a dove, created by students from the Ontario College of Art and Design.

Students, teachers and community members will have the opportunity to participate in this part of the project at the FAB studio.

The completed dove

will be unveiled at a media event

in May 2013 at Nathan Philips

Square.

The TCDSB Safe Schools Dept. thanks you for your enthusiasm

and commitment to this important and exciting project.