The first-ever count by the Prosecutor's Office on school bullying has clearly shown that last year there were 1,196 serious cases of bullying in the State. At least these are the cases that reached the public prosecutor's office. It's not yet possible to compare the statistical evolution this data represents because it's the only annual report so far, but these cases don't include all those that never reach the courts. The difficulties and reluctance to report behaviors that affect minors—and which very often involve other minors under 14 years old, who therefore cannot be prosecuted—mean that many cases simply end with a change of school. Recently, cases of teenage suicides have come to light in different parts of the State, where those around them have pointed to bullying as the trigger. This is the case of Sandra Peña, a 9th-grade girl from Seville who took her own life last October, and of two young women from Jaén who committed suicide together in a park. In Catalonia, police are investigating the death of a 15-year-old boy in Lleida, and two years ago, 12-year-old twins attempted suicide in Sallent. The boy died, and the girl was seriously injured. In all these cases, those close to the victims mention bullying as a trigger, but the difficulty in clarifying the motive behind a suicide—which is always multifactorial—makes it difficult to predict or know the full extent of the consequences of bullying, whether in the classroom or on social media. In fact, according to a 2023 Save the Children study, 42% of young Catalans—the equivalent of 10 students in a class of 25—have suffered cyberbullying during childhood. Currently, school bullying is not specifically defined as a crime in the Penal Code, despite... the repeated requests that have been made for it to be classified as a crimeThe majority of convictions for serious cases of bullying These actions are carried out under the protection of Article 173 of this law, which punishes degrading treatment and is part of the chapter dedicated to torture and crimes against moral integrity. "Although there is no specific crime, it can still be punished, but we consider this insufficient," says lawyer Noelia Rebón, who specializes in bullying and children's rights. In their opinion, the ideal solution would be to specify school bullying within the same law in order to penalize serious cases, as has already been done with workplace or housing harassment, which have a specific mention within the same crime of degrading treatment.

"Schools should be a safe place," lamented Eider Bustos, spokesperson for the Student Union. Like her, some 1,500 students, according to the Guardia Urbana, took to the streets of Barcelona on Tuesday to protest against bullying following the suicide of Sandra, a 14-year-old girl in Seville who had reported bullying, and to demand an investigation. The suicide of a minor in Almacelles in July, who had reported being a victim of bullying. The protesters demanded more resources to prevent this scourge, improve the mental health of young people, and end hate speech. "They are not suicides, they are murders," claimed the student march, which started at Plaça Universitat and ended at Plaça Sant Jaume, in front of the Palau de la Generalitat and Barcelona City Hall.

Gisela Vaquero (Besalú, 1984) is a video game designer, producer, and content creator. She is the founder of Jellyworld Games and the Women in Games association, which supports female video game developers.

She attended the Salvador Vilarrasa School in Besalú. "It was right next to my house, but I often woke up to the music already playing, signaling everyone was leaving, and I was always the last to arrive," she says. She was a very introverted child, "very quiet and calm." "My parents weren't around much. A relative looked after me; I used to call her." Uncle Botey, and he taught me the alphabet before I could even walk. We had a table with painted games, goose, checkers, chess, and he taught me how to play. And that stuck," she adds.

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This year, the Catalan education system has launched the REVA, the Registry of Violence Against Students. Broadly speaking, the tool is a shared registry in which all schools and colleges are required to report and detail cases of bullying, as well as other types of violence, that they detect among students. The Department of Education implemented the resource approximately a year ago, but it wasn't until September 2024 that it became mandatory for educational centers to use it. According to this registry, since the start of the 2024-2025 school year, Catalan schools and colleges have recorded up to 1,333 cases of bullying in Catalan classrooms, where there are more than 1,600,000 students.

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"I hadn't seen him well for a long time. Until one day he told me: «Mom, I just want to die...»". Told through tears by his mother, Joel's story is a case –one more– of bullying. A chapter of suffering that it ends With the help of a psychologist and a change of center, which will be forever marked. There is much work to be done –one in four children are bullied– But awareness of bullying is also growing. The Department of Education and Vocational Training's case count increases each academic year: 347 in the 21-22 academic year; double that, 684, in the 22-23 academic year; and 52% more, 1,042, in the 23-24 academic year. May 2nd is, in fact, the International Day Against Bullying and Harassment at School.

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I have learned a lot from my daughter and her friends. They have shown me things that are fundamental to understanding who I am today.

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A few days ago the girl, 14 years old, attempted suicide. The family had been attentive for some time, because they knew that this could happen at any time. "When she was 11 years old, she already verbalised every day that she wanted to kill herself, but she didn't know how to do it", explains Pilar, her mother, who found out during a visit to the psychiatrist at Sant Joan de Déu that the girl had been "thinking about how to do it" for a year and a half.

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"You have to explain that this is not an isolated case", implores a mother on the other end of the phone, E.P., who took her daughter to Manyanet Sant Andreu school until three years ago. "I took her out of there because she was being bullied. During primary school I asked the school for explanations several times, and I even asked to change her class, but the headmaster never received me. They always left the main teachers alone", she told ARA. She changed her daughter's school when she felt strong enough, when she saw that she was "ready" and when the Consorci d'Educació found her a place in another school in the neighbourhood. "They only helped me when they saw that I was willing to go all the way", she says. The girl had already finished 1st ESO and had even suffered physical aggression from a group of students. Now she is in the 4th year of ESO and is "happy" to go to another school.

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Her parents do not want any other minor to suffer the same fate as their daughter. She committed suicide on May 19, on her way to the school where she studied, Manyanet Sant Andreu. She was 15 years old. The day before they noticed she behaved "a little different" at home: "We asked her if she was tired and told her to stop studying for a while," her father told ARA, who says he wants to know "what was the trigger" for the death of his only daughter. The teenager's family claims she was the victim of bullying and that the school knew about it and did nothing to stop it. Therefore, although they have not filed a formal complaint, they are providing information to the Mossos d'Esquadra, which according to the ACN are collecting and analysing all the information and will transfer it in official letter to the court which will determine what line to follow. At the same time, the parents have also brought the case to the Catalan Ombudsman, who is already working on it "with absolute confidentiality".

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