Eagle Harbor High student leads school in Unity Day

Published 11:05 am Sunday, November 2, 2014

The staff and students of the Commodore K-12 Options School may have celebrated National Unity Day one day early, but they did it with style.

Eagle Harbor High School student Otis Doxtater led all the students in a silent march to an anti-bullying assembly Tuesday, Oct. 21, where he spoke of his own experiences with bullying and the importance of unity in schools.

Islanders may have seen the junior student take a public stance against bullying in the past. Doxtater has spent hours in the parking lot near McDonald’s with a sign that reads “Love and Equality” on one side, and “Stop Bullying” on the other.

“Bullying has always been a big part of my life,” Doxtater told the gathered students, and he went on to share how he himself had been a victim of bullying as well as his siblings, which ultimately inspired him to take a stand against it.

“At Eagle Harbor High School everyone knows everyone and people are very accepting,” he said. “I really found the right fit here. Now I want to help others feel they can talk freely about bullying prevention and know their actions can make a difference.”

Before the Tuesday morning assembly, Doxtater visited classrooms with a strip of orange paper for each student. On one side students wrote what makes them special and unique and on the other side they described an action they will take to prevent bullying.

Each classroom’s orange chain was then linked together at the assembly, and will be displayed in the main lobby.

National Unity Day is a day when schools, organizations and communities take a united stand against bullying.

Everyone is encouraged to wear orange in the spirit of support, hope and solidarity with the message that ending bullying has to start with each of us.