BOSTON – The Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH) released a comprehensive guide to help prevent bullying in public schools Thursday, with an added focus on protecting gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students.”Direct from the Field” A Guide to Bullying Prevention” was released at a round table discussion on the topic of bullying hosted by JRI Health, the Justice Resource Institute’s health division which serves the needs of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth.The guide contains information on the different forms of bullying, how to recognize and stop harassment and a road map for teachers and administrators to implement successful bullying prevention programs for their students.This guide comes at the same time that the House of Representatives is considering a bill that would require school districts to develop a comprehensive bullying program at each school with liaisons to the administration that would help enforce a no tolerance bullying policy.”Our kids deserve to grow up in an environment that is free from harassment and violence,” said DPH Commissioner John Auerbach. “The consequences of bullying can last a lifetime, but all too often it is treated as a rite of passage. Bullying is not an inevitable part of growing up and we need to do more to stop it.”The release of the guide also follows several high profile bullying incidents, both locally and nationally, that have focused the nations attention on the cruelty of some students.In early April, eight teenage girls received national attention when they brutally beat a 16-year-old classmate and posted the incident on YouTube.com. A similar incident took place in Worcester a few weeks later that resulted in the arrest of several students from a neighboring town.In Lynn, the issue of bullying surfaced in March when the parents of 11-year-old Mathew Mumbauer claimed their son was paralyzed by a bully who pushed him down the stairs at the Brickett Elementary School.Superintendent Nicholas Kostan said he had not reviewed the bullying prevention guide since its release, but indicated that the district has been working with District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett on his own bullying prevention efforts.”The DA has been doing a lot of work with this recently,” he said. “We are receiving a lot of information on that.”According to numbers provided by the state, kids who are bullied are five times more likely to become depressed, were more likely than their peers to attempt suicide and were nearly 60 percent more likely to commit a crime by age 24.The guide released Thursday has a particular focus on homosexual and transgender students, who according to state numbers are significantly more likely to report bullying or fear of attending school.”All young people need to feel safe to learn and develop to their full potential,” said Grace Sterling Stowell, executive director of the Boston Alliance for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Youth. “We know that in school settings, kids who are perceived as different are often targeted by bullies. This includes gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth. We also know that gender variant youth are most at risk.”Auerbach said the department would send copies of the bullying prevention guide to every school district in the state.