The problem addressed by this project is peer violence. Polish schools are not prepared to counteract this phenomenon effectively. According to the Ombudsman’s report ‘Equal treatment at school’ (2021), more than 60% of students in the final grades of primary schools experience ridicule and exclusion, one in four is bullied and more than one third experience hitting and pushing. This is an educational and research project which constitutes a further step in developing an innovative method of anti-violence education for school-age boys.

In 2022, we implemented the School of Anti-Bullying Trainers Sztama. In this project, we are implementing the previously developed method and testing how it works in practice. We are also conducting a qualitative ethnographic study to identify and understand the mechanisms of peer violence among teenage boys.

Within the project we carry out WenDo workshops with teenagers and teachers, an anti-violence workshop called Sztama with boys and anti-violence training on masculinity patterns for male educational staff. We will publish the research and present it at the project’s closing conference, during which we will hold a panel discussion with the experts conducting the research.

The project will contribute to a change in the approach to developing anti-discrimination programmes for children and young people to include a gender perspective in the content development and classroom methodology. Our beneficiaries are school students (girls and boys aged 14-16), people working in the field of education (formal and non-formal) and all individuals, organisations and entities that create and/or implement anti-discrimination programmes for children and young people.