Impact of the TEI Peer Tutoring Program on Coexistence, Bullying and Cyberbullying in Spanish Schools.

The TEI peer tutoring program (in Spanish, Tutoría entre Iguales, hereinafter TEI ) is Spain's most important coexistence program for the prevention of violence and bullying in secondary schools and one of the first worldwide. So that we may better appreciate the effectiveness and benefits of this program, a comparative study has been developed between four schools that are presently following this preventive strategy (TEI centres) and four other schools that do not carry out the TEI program (non-TEI centres). Controlling the other sociodemographic variables, students' perception of coexistence, bullying and cyberbullying has been evaluated. In total, 1015 secondary school students belonging to eight schools from four autonomous communities in Spain participated. The results reveal that the students of TEI centres have a more favourable perception of educational coexistence and indicate lower rates of bullying and cyberbullying than those studying at non-TEI centres. These results highlight the benefits of the TEI program and the need to continue promoting and expanding these preventing bullying strategies in schools.

The importance of prevention programs to reduce bullying: A comparative study.

Bullying is a growing and increasingly worrying phenomenon. In recent years, a number of different bullying prevention programs have been implemented to create a more positive school environment. This paper offers a description of these prevention programs, focussing on the three most commonly implemented in schools: TEI, KiVa and Mediation Teams. A qualitative, descriptive and comparative analysis was made using semi-structured interviews with tutors, coordinators and experts at nine schools, three schools for each of the programs. The results show that these bullying prevention programs help raise awareness of this problem within the entire school community, improving the school environment and reducing conflict and instances of bullying. Overall, participating schools reported being highly satisfied with the results of these programs and it is therefore important to consider the mandatory implementation of bullying prevention programs in all schools.