r/Millennials • u/RhubarbGoldberg • Jan 23 '25
Serious I was part of a public school social experiment in central Florida in the 90s to help middle school kids get along better, and IT WORKED. Project Harmony worked.
Project Harmony was started by my county in FL in the mid 90s and it was designed to help kids get along better and decrease school violence and absenteeism.
One day, in seventh grade, I was pulled from class for a meeting along with forty other girls or so. They selected the biggest social outliers: the most popular, the most unpopular, the biggest bullies, the most bullied, and told us all we were going to camp. In the middle of the school year!
We took busses and were sent to Project Harmony, a campground, for a week of activities. Maybe two weeks, now that I think about it.
We did typical summer camp / scout camp style activities, we sang songs, did crafts, and we had (what I now recognize as) group therapy sessions where we openly talked about bullying, disagreements, fighting.
It fucking worked. Before Project Harmony, I was a pariah and was often bullied, jumped, or dragged into fights. The violence decreased significantly and all the girls who went made genuine connections that bridged gaps once we got back to school.
The program made us humanize each other. I found out a girl bullying me had abusive parents, she found out I could actually register emotional and physical pain and she regretted her actions. And so on. We played games together and became sorta friends. From then on, when we'd pass each other, we were nice and kind.
It was awesome. I'm so proud that I was part of it.
At the end of the camp, our parents came, and we all sang Love Can Build a Bridge and it was lovely. It felt optimistic and hopeful.
I work in mental health now and I think I learned a lot of my foundation at Project Harmony.
I wish programs like this existed and were more widespread.
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u/ThrashingDancer888 Jan 23 '25
That’s incredible! What a gift to you and those girls. I can share my experience, I went to a summer camp for underprivileged kids in 4th grade. I was a child of a single teen mom, living in low income housing. Never would’ve went otherwise. The camp took me shopping, bought me all new clothes and toiletries to go to camp for a week, new swimsuit, bedding, stuffed animal, etc. and we got to go canoeing and hiking and did all kinds of crafts and activities. It was something that enriched my childhood and I am still friends with a few of those kids to this day, I’m nearly 37. Idk who funds these programs but I wish they were more readily available for more kids cuz it really does make a difference!
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u/RhubarbGoldberg Jan 23 '25
That is amazing, what an awesome program!! The shopping so you had what you needed is truly inspired.
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u/Acrobatic-Variety-52 Jan 23 '25
You’d be shocked at how often these programs are funded by the government 🙂. There are a lot of other private foundations too that provide funding as well as individual donors, but these sorts of programs are also funded through state and federal public health programs.
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u/ii_akinae_ii Jan 24 '25
too bad they're all going to be deemed "governmental waste" now and canned to make room in the budget for more billionaire tax cuts... sacrificing the american people for capital
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u/CheeseFries92 Jan 25 '25
Right? Also, these kinds of programs are SO cheap compared to a single fucking military drone used to kill innocent civilians 😡
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u/QueerTree Jan 23 '25
I’m a middle school teacher and my whole THING is trying to help my students feel a sense of belonging and connection because that matters way more than anything else I could do with my time ❤️
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u/MrdrOfCrws Jan 23 '25
I'm just imagining the teachers all sitting around picking who should participate, debating who's the biggest loser in the school.
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u/LeePacesEyebrows2016 Jan 24 '25
"Shelly WAS the most popular but did you see what she was wearing today??"
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u/cultkiller Jan 23 '25
My school did something similar they called a “respect retreat” right before 8th grade every student was part of a lock-in all day event. We talked about bullying and everyone held a candle and we all stopped to listen if they wanted to talk about their experience being bullied or regret about bullying others. There were lots of tears and apologies and I 100% think it really increased empathy and respect overall all through high school. I was also part of an elementary school state experiment on A-F grading versus “ungraded” that was really successful. I feel sad my kid’s schools are way less invested in stuff like this.
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u/vashtachordata Jan 23 '25
I think my school did a version of this. We didn’t go anywhere, but we had people come in 7th grade and we did a few days to a week of camp like activities at school focusing on team building and getting along. We sang lean on me a lot. I only vaguely remember this and always thought it was weird, but I remember it being an overall positive experience. Would have been about 98 in an outlying suburb in TX.
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u/RhubarbGoldberg Jan 23 '25
I feel like the 90s were all about can't we all just get along.
That sounds pretty cool and worth the effort!
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u/Sea-Operation7215 Jan 23 '25
I was a camp professional in my twenties and every day I saw the awesome power of camp - it really transforms lives. All camps, at their foundation, are communities. Having a positive example of how communities can be beneficial is invaluable imo. I wish we valued play and recreation more, too. and I’m so happy you had a transformative experience.
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u/RhubarbGoldberg Jan 23 '25
Absolutely social, group play is so crucial for human development!! Camp is so clutch, hard agree.
I was super lucky to get picked for Project Harmony. It helped with bullying, race relations, all kinds of social issues were vastly improved by the program.
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u/____ozma Jan 23 '25
My school did something called Challenge Day, where for the full day, we did exercises that would help us understand each other better. Sharing our losses, family struggles, what it feels like to be bullied, and games together. Every single person that did it said it was a positive experience. Probably 2006?
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u/chels4590 Jan 23 '25
We did camp for 3.5 days in 7th grade as apart of the school year. It was such a bonding experience, I remember how close we felt to one another afterwards. I wish there was more of that in kids’ lives today, It’s so worth it.
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u/GemGlamourNGlitter Jan 23 '25
I'm glad it worked for you, this would have never worked at my middle school. We had a stop the violence campaign and people who participated were bullied even more.
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u/RhubarbGoldberg Jan 23 '25
The magnitude of both approaches makes them wildly different. Yeah, two hours in an auditorium won't cut it. This was isolated, intensive group therapy and trust / bonding exercises in the woods, away from all other influences. By the fourth day, we were all peaceful, by the end of it, some of us genuinely liked each other.
It wasn't a couple hours here or there, it was nonstop for 10-14 days. We stayed in open dorms, ate family style meals, and had professional help surrounding us.
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u/GemGlamourNGlitter Jan 23 '25
We weren't in an auditorium. It was a series of workshops we went to in groups. While we weren't in the woods toasting marshmallows, we did a lot of what you described.
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u/Feisty-Resource-1274 Jan 23 '25
I feel like the toasting marshmallows bit is actually important. While the therapy breaks down walls and helps people empathize with one another, that's not going to necessarily build positive relationships as well as shared experiences outside of therapy.
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u/TurduckenII Jan 23 '25
Do you think it could work again? I worry that having cell phones would harm an effort like this, but so many parents wouldn't allow kids to be without their phones for a week, much less to do anything away from home for a week when it isn't their idea.
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u/RhubarbGoldberg Jan 23 '25
Yeah, you'd have to cut the digital cord for most of it to get quality time. It would be more difficult to implement now because our boomer parents didn't care where we went or what we did, lol. But I absolutely believe in the infrastructure and its potential to work again. Absolutely!
We did camp stuff, like hiking, foraging, canoes, all that fun stuff, we had chores, the counseling sessions (that they named something else), lots of bonding/trust exercises and ice breakers, we all had to help with meals and clean up after ourselves. We had movie nights in the open dorm, lol. When you and your bully are both bawling at Fried Green Tomatoes or Steel Magnolias, it helps bridge the gaps. I'm pretty sure The Color Purple may have been shown too.
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u/food-dood Jan 23 '25
Same. I did something like this as the unpopular kid. The popular kids just made up stories about what went down and the rest of the class believed them. The other kids just went along with the popular kids because of you didn't, good luck finding friends.
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u/jerseyknits Jan 23 '25
I was in a Catholic high School in the early 2000s and while I can't remember the name of the retreat, some of you might have remembered the final phrase, Be the 4th.
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u/skippy51 Jan 25 '25
we did something like this city wide, with a few kids from each school. it was called Anytown, USA and was sponsored by the NCCJ.
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u/Nikbot10 Jan 23 '25
What a beautiful story. Thank you for sharing it with us. I’m so glad you had that experience and that you now help others. Kindness goes so far in life! ❤️
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u/CenterofChaos Jan 24 '25
I had a similar experience in grade 5, although we were told it was so city kids could experience camping and farming. We got to milk cows on a farm and muck stalls. And also did day hikes and learned foraging.
We had out houses, and the doors were stupidly short so the girls would band together and take turns standing in front of the doors so we all could poop in peace without boys bothering us. One of the girls got her first period in the middle of the night and the others were afraid to wake the teachers. Myself and another girl had involved moms so they woke us up because they figured our moms must have prepared us for this (spoiler our moms did). We walked her through applying a pad in the dark with a flashlight.
Unfortunately our city did K-5 in one set of schools then 6-8 in a different set so we got separated afterwards. I was mercilessly bullied for those years. I think if we stayed together we'd have been friends.
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u/Critical_Concert_689 Jan 24 '25
God that sounds like such a lawsuit in modern times.
"They selected the biggest social outliers..."
Oh fuck no: "Excuse us, we've determined that your kid is the most unpopular and bullied kid in school. Please sign this parental field trip waiver so we can take them to a 2 week mental health clinic."
This sort of thing is also cost prohibitive in a lot of places. A 2 week summer camp? Your parents probably forked out 2 grand for it unless the government was massively subsidizing it - in which case it wouldn't work for larger groups of people due to cost.
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u/RhubarbGoldberg Jan 24 '25
It was free to all the kids and I think on paper we were selected for "leadership potential."
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u/Critical_Concert_689 Jan 24 '25
was free to all the kids
the government was massively subsidizing it - in which case it wouldn't work for larger groups of people due to cost.
I think these summer camps, in general, are great experiences for anyone able to participate. But the specifics on this one sound really funny to me: "Leadership potential" comes across very differently than the "biggest social outliers."
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u/RhubarbGoldberg Jan 25 '25
Okay? I guess it was all a conspiracy? Idk what you're saying here. Many social outliers do tend to have leadership qualities, by social convention leaders tend to be more rare than followers. They chose the leaders of all the cliques, the popular ones and the bullies who commanded attention. I was bullied, but I wasn't quiet about it either. Idk what you mean, so whatever. I respect your opinion that the now defunct, but at its time very successful, publicly funded emotional support camp program is "funny" because a lay person's reddit post made 30 years after the fact didn't convey the selection metrics in a manner that was aggressively clinical enough to meet your standards.
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