Warwick Veterans Junior High School had a somewhat tumultuous first year, as 7th and 8th graders from all around the city convened at the former high school. The students, adjusting to a much larger school, both in number of students and physical size, dealt with a notably large amount of bullying and conflict.

Assistant Principal Allison Nascenzi, who focuses on climate and culture in the school, partly attests this bumpy start to social life to the change in scenery but thought there was more to it than that.

“We needed a huge culture shift here after last year,” Nascenzi said Monday morning. “Instead of being reactive when it comes to discipline and punishment, we want to be proactive this year in creating a better environment for students.”

In an effort to address the issue the school, through the City of Warwick’s Youth Program and Task Force’s funding, hosted Keith Deltano to speak to the students on Monday. The first event in a line of many this year that Vets is using to change the culture of the school, Deltano addressed 7th and 8th grade students about bullying.

Deltano, who won the teaching excellence award for his work in elementary schools, currently tours the country speaking to middle and high school students about bullying, which he believes to be important because of the high rates of teen depression, suicide, bulimia, anorexia and self-inflicted wounds. He knows how prevalent bullying of all kinds is through his experiences and also through his own childhood. Deltano told the Vets students a personal anecdote where, during high school, a guidance counselor told him he wasn’t smart enough to go to college, so he should just take the minimum classes required to graduate high school.

“I had OCD, ADHD, dyslexia, CAPD,” Deltano said. “I had every letter of the alphabet in disorders growing up…I played football because I had muscles, but I didn’t even really like it.”

What perhaps sets Deltano apart from other anti-bullying campaigns is the element of comedy that he brings to each speech. He had the middle schoolers laughing and engaged through making fun of himself, calling out kids in the crowd and even bringing up kids for a skit. In the performance, a boy gets bullied by a peer and a bystander takes action to stop the bullying by stepping in, which Deltano says doesn’t happen nearly enough in schools, even if it just means getting some friends (played by a group of girls in the skit) and telling the bully to stop.

Deltano used his comedic charm to connect with the students, exclaiming for all who were in the auditorium that he was “here for all the kids who are different. It’s good to be different…I’m weird and I like it!”

Despite his comedic barbs and eccentric style, he maintained a grasp of the serious nature of the bullying epidemic that affects so many kids at a young age.

“There are four types of bullying,” Deltano told the kids. “Physical, verbal, online and exclusion…Well, what exactly is exclusion bullying? It happens from about 2nd grade, and it’s about kids forming cliques and ganging up on the kids who are different, even if some kids in the clique don’t even want to.”

Deltano expressed anger for the kind of bullying that happens in schools, especially in regards to online bullying, talking about the “cowards” who hide behind screens and push people to do destructive things, like a boy who was driven to suicide in Texas.

“After he committed suicide, kids would say, ‘Well I didn’t know what was going on at his house. I didn’t know he had those other problems,’” Deltano said. Then, looking at a silent room of students that understood the seriousness of the story, Deltano pointed out, “But you never know what’s going on with someone and, even if they act like they don’t care, you don’t truly know.”

Deltano touched on plenty of specific examples of bullying, like the pressure young girls are under to look a certain way, or the fact that boys are excluded just because they don’t “shoot an orange ball through a basket” or play football. But he maintained the idea that normalcy, popularity and fitting in are overrated, and none of the social nonsense kids care so much about is going to matter after high school.

“The sooner you kids realize that, the better,” Deltano said.

The self-proclaimed “weird” speaker said in an interview after his presentation that he uses a combination of original comedy and very serious anecdotes to “act as a net that pulls out hurting and bullied kids from the crowd…I’m looking to change school culture for the long-term and to save lives of kids who need help.”

After the speech, individual students went up to speak with him about certain issues they faced in school, and he made sure to speak with each of them.

As the students filed out of the Vets auditorium, Deltano and the school’s administrators and staff hoped that his message got through to the kids. As Assistant Principal Nascenzi set out to do with this and many other events at Vets this year, Deltano left the students with a demand: “Let’s make it a different year; let’s make it a better year.”

More information about Keith Deltano and his campaign can be found at DontBullyOnline.com.