The 8th annual Pledge to End Bullying is officially underway.
The launch of the program locally took place at Hotel Dieu Grace Healthcare which is a hosting agency.
CEO Janice Kaffer says this year the focus is around homelessness and how to respond to those people without a home.
"How can I, how can we, how can you how can each one of us make a difference. So the pledge is the first start to hopefully a year-long change in behavior for many of our community members who have an experience of not necessarily noticing the people in our community that need help"
CEO Janice Kaffer says changing the attitude around how homeless people are treated will reduce bullying.
"They're not talking about that as somehow that it's their faulty that's the case. That maybe then children will grow up in schools and families where they will see kids who have a little bit less or different as not someone to be attacked or bullied but someone to be embraced with compassion and love"
Family Services Executive Director Joyce Zuk says homelessness needs to be treated differently.
Windsor Essex Family Services Executive Director Joyce Zuk, November 5, 2018 (by AM800's Peter Langille)
"To look at this problem in a different way, and that way is that if we approach this issue of homelessness with compassion that'll lead to us having a greater understanding and in turn that will lead to us joining together as a community for a permanent solution"
You can make the pledge by going to http://www.thepledgetoendbullying.ca/
The other partner agencies are the Windsor Essex Community Health Centres, Canadian Mental Health Association and Conseil scolaire catholique Providence.