Kids tell how they are no longer bullied

Last fall, Long Island students told Newsday their stories of being bullied at the hands of other students they saw daily. They were teased, pushed, called names. It happened in and out of school, they said.

It happened even on the school bus. Today, Newsday goes back to three of those students, who tell us how life has gotten better.

Marie Krzeminski, 15, Long Beach

In January, two girls who'd regularly bullied Maria apologized to her. She accepted.

"They said they thought they were just joking around," she said. "We shook hands . . . I said 'It's OK.' "

The apology came after Maria, a sophomore at Long Beach High School, spoke out at a Challenge Day workshop, a special event that aims to curb bullying and violence. She continues to speak out, now as a founding member of Long Beach High School's new anti-bullying club, "We're Not Gonna Take It," which formed after the Newsday story and now has about 30 members.

The club created an 8-foot-tall pillar-like poster with its new anti-bullying pledge, and recently hundreds of students took time out from lunch to sign it.

And tomorrow, Maria and other club members will speak to hundreds of educators at the Long Island Youth Safety Coalition's second Internet Safety and Bullying Prevention Conference at Hofstra University.

Faculty adviser and Dean Phil Bruno said: "We need to change the culture of the school to encourage people to show support, and empathy toward other people's problems. If there's enough of us, we can intervene, we can help stop things and show it's wrong."

School days are much smoother now for Maria, who said she'd been targeted for three years by a group of girls who called her names and threw paper balls at her in class. She's getting better grades in school and her father, George Krzeminski, said he's gotten nothing but good reports from her teachers.

"It feels better," Maria said. "I feel safer in school, more protected and, like, if something happens I go to the dean because he's the one who helps me. I like school now.

Gavin Ingraham, 9, Ridge

The fourth-grader who endured regular bullying on the school bus now attends the Miller Avenue Elementary School in the adjoining district of Sachem, where his family bought a house. His mother, Christina Ingraham, said he's enjoying the school, but is wary of riding the bus.

And recently, she said, his teacher showed her the story he'd written when told to write about something that had affected him. It was on bullying.

Christina Inghraham said she wrote to the World Wrestling Entertainment organization, telling Gavin's story. The family has learned Gavin might appear in a WWE website online video with his favorite wrestler, John Cena, who has made it one of his causes to stop the spread of bullying.

Gavin said he was excited about the possibly of meeting with Cena. "I'd say hi and tell him how I like him a lot. I love wrestling," he said.

He also loves his new school. "It's awesome," Gavin said. "In my new school there's no bullying, and I got a bunch of new friends now . . . When [people] ask me, I say I used to be bullied and that's why I came to this school."

"Asked if he worries about bullying, he said, "Sometimes I think that [bullying] could happen. Not a lot anymore."

Sam Villanueva, 16, Brentwood

High school junior Sam Villanueva had been bullied regularly by other boys in school since enrolling in the Brentwood district in ninth grade. He was teased and called gay for having long hair, purple pants and friends who were gay.

After the story appeared in which he told of his experiences, the bullying stopped, he said.

"Things have been going good. I haven't had any problems with people," he said. "No one spoke directly to me; they didn't apologize but they just stopped doing it. I felt good, finally, like a load off. I was happy not to be bothered with that anymore.

"Some teachers came up to me and said, 'Oh, you were the kid in the newspaper. That's good, sticking up for yourself and talking about it.' There's still bullying in the school but I don't see it as much with me and my friends. The school did start an anti-bullying club but I am not in it because I'm busy with other things after school."

One of the good results of the experience, he said, was that he's grown more open with his parents.

"I hadn't really talked to them about it," he said of the bullying. "Then my parents said they were proud I was sticking up for myself and that they were there for me, and I could come talk to them if I needed to.

"Sometimes they'll ask me if something is bothering me, if there is any trouble, and I'll be open with them, and talk to them almost as if they were a friend . . . now they're not just assuming that everything is all right. They're taking the initiative to come ask me if something is wrong and I would tell them the truth. If it's yes, I talk to them and if it's no, they'll leave it at that. It feels like they trust me more and we have a better connection."

Other things have changed as well: "January came around, I said 2011 is going to be a new me, no problems, I'm going to be more mature, so I cut my hair. I sort of grew out of the long-hair look, for my own self." And he's planning on joining the Marines after graduation, because he "wanted something to push me past my limits."

But, he said, "I still wear my purple pants."