District 87 Superintendent Barry Reilly (left) and Bloomington High School Athletic Director John Szabo joined WJBC's Scott Laughlin to discuss the schools' efforts to stop bullying. (Photo by Eric Stock/WJBC) 

By Eric Stock 

BLOOMINGTON - Bloomington and Heyworth high schools are getting lessons on how to prevent bullying and substance abuse.

Chestnut Health Systems of Bloomington hosting assemblies at Heyworth on Wednesday and Bloomington on Thursday to teach students about how to make the best choices to keep themselves and their classmates safe.

District 87 Superintendent Barry Reilly said the recent shooting at Normal Community was an example of how students can't take their safety for granted.

"It's not as if you are 'ratting out' - in kids' terms - someone who has thrown a paper airplane across the room. That's not a big deal in the grand scheme of life, but the incident we saw that we saw in our community was much, much greater than than," Reilly said.

Reilly said bullying has taken on a new realm in recent years with the expansion of social media.

"The bullying can take effect through things like Facebook, text-messaging and those kinds of things and that tends to happen outside of the school and yet, it gets brought into the school, so it creates a different dynamic for teachers and administrators to help work through their kids," Reilly said.

Students also heard the inspirational story of a musician, author and computer consultant who lost everything to a drug addiction and was able to turn his life around.

'Super Star' will share his story on WJBC at 6:10 a.m. Friday. You can listen live here on WJBC.com.

Eric Stock can be reached at eric.stock@cumulus.com.