A cinematic lesson in character in Rockville Centre

South Side Middle School students, faculty and staff took an unusual field trip on May 22. They went to see the hard-hitting, eye-opening documentary “Bully.”

“It was so cool — it was amazing to take the entire school,” said Principal Shelagh McGinn. “It’s the first time we’ve ever taken everyone on a field trip — faculty, staff, whoever wished to come, and we left here, we went to Loews Raceway Theater in Westbury, we were 22 buses, we were in three theaters and we were the only ones there, I think.” All of the bus drivers watched the movie as well, she said.

The trip came about after McGinn, who had previewed the documentary over the April break, found while visiting the film’s website, thebullyproject.com, that there was an organization called donorschoose.org that would accept applications to fund the trip, which cost between $5,000 and $6,000. Victor Lee, the middle school’s library media specialist, assisted McGinn with the paperwork and contacted the theater, while Carol Vitelli, who handles district transportation, arranged for the buses. They planned the whole trip in three weeks.

“I think that teaching kids to grow up to be people of good character, their social and emotional growth, is as important as their academic growth,” McGinn said. “We follow the Golden Rule — we do a lot here to treat others as you would wish to be treated, and I think the lasting effect of the trip in this school will be that we can carry on what we learned in the documentary. It validates what we do as members of this school community, and I think it helped the kids put this into their own sort of perspective.”

McGinn said that the film held everyone rapt. “You could hear a pin drop in the theaters,” she said. “It was very compelling.” She added that the spirit and unity it engendered extended well beyond the movie.