How to Complete and File the NYC DOE Incident Report Form

To report bullying, harassment, discrimination, or intimidation in an NYC public school, you don’t use a single printable NYC DOE incident report form. You file through the Respect for All program using the online Bullying Reporting Portal at nycenet.edu/bullyingreporting, by phone, by email, or in person at your child’s school. The portal accepts complaints in any language. Once the report reaches the school, the principal or a designee has five school days to begin investigating and ten school days to notify you of the outcome in writing.¹

How to File

Pick the channel that fits your situation. All of them put your complaint on the record.

Online: submit through the Bullying Reporting Portal at nycenet.edu/bullyingreporting, or through your NYC Schools Account at schoolsaccount.nyc.¹
Phone: call the NYC Public Schools help line at 718-935-2288, Monday through Friday, 8 AM to 6 PM.¹
Email: write to RespectforAll@schools.nyc.gov, which reaches the Office of Safety and Youth Development.²
In person: tell any staff member, or ask for the school’s Respect for All Liaison. Every school has one.¹

If the incident involves sexual or gender-based harassment, also contact the DOE Title IX Coordinator at 718-935-4987 or Title_IX_Inquiries@schools.nyc.gov.¹ For allegations of sexual misconduct by a staff member toward a student, reports go to the Office of Special Investigations at 718-935-3800.

After the school receives your report, staff must enter it into the Online Occurrence Reporting System (OORS). Ask for the OORS report number and write it down. That number is how you track what happens next.

What to Put in the Report

The more specific your complaint, the less back-and-forth later. Try to gather this before you file:

The full name and school of the student who was targeted. If you have the student’s nine-digit OSIS number from a report card or NYCSA, include it to help the school pull records faster.
The date, approximate time, and specific location — hallway, classroom number, playground, bus stop.
Full names of the student or students involved and anyone who witnessed what happened.
A factual description of the conduct. Stick to what was said, done, or sent. “Student A called Student B a slur and shoved them into a locker” is more useful than “Student A was being mean.”
Whether this was a one-time incident or part of a pattern. Ongoing bullying changes how the school should respond.
Any bias category involved. If the conduct targeted the student because of race, religion, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, national origin, citizenship or immigration status, disability, or weight, say so. These categories affect how the school classifies and investigates the report.³

Keep a personal copy of what you submit and note the date you filed. If you have screenshots, photos, emails, or other supporting evidence, attach them to the online report or bring them to the school.

Saving Digital Evidence

Cyberbullying cases often come down to whether you saved the evidence before it disappeared. Students who harass online delete posts, deactivate accounts, and claim someone else used their phone. Screenshot everything right away.

For texts and direct messages, your screenshots need the sender’s name or number, the full message, and the date and time stamp. Don’t crop. For social media, capture the profile name, the post, and any visible timestamps. If the harassment stretches across platforms or days, put the screenshots in chronological order before you hand them over. A folder of 40 unlabeled images weakens your complaint.

Save evidence in more than one place. Email the files to yourself, upload them to cloud storage, print hard copies. Phones break and files get deleted by accident. The school may be able to recover material that was already deleted, but don’t count on it. What you preserve yourself is the record you can rely on.

What the School Must Do After You File

The school must notify the parents of both the targeted student and the accused student no later than two school days after the principal or designee receives the report.¹ You can ask for support services for your child right away. You don’t have to wait for the investigation to finish.

Within five school days of receiving the report, the principal or designee must interview the targeted student, the accused student, and any witnesses separately. Each person is asked to prepare a written statement. The school must also gather available evidence, including any video surveillance.³

At the end of the investigation, the principal reviews the evidence and decides whether the allegations are substantiated by a preponderance of the evidence, meaning it is more likely than not that the conduct occurred. The findings go into OORS, and the school must notify parents in writing of whether the allegations were substantiated and whether the conduct violated the regulation. That written notice is due within ten school days of the school receiving the report, barring unusual circumstances.³

If allegations are substantiated, the school must tell you to contact them to discuss follow-up actions and available supports for your child. The school can take interim measures while the investigation is pending, such as adjusting class schedules or increasing supervision, especially when the targeted student’s safety is at immediate risk.

If the Outcome Doesn’t Fix the Problem

When the written resolution doesn’t address what happened, or the bullying continues after the case closes, you have options past the school building. Start with the school’s superintendent or the district office, and give them your OORS report number. You can also email the Office of Safety and Youth Development again at RespectforAll@schools.nyc.gov to report that the issue remains unresolved.

For complaints involving discrimination based on race, national origin, sex, or disability, you can escalate to the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR). Federal law requires the complaint to be filed within 180 days of the last discriminatory act.⁴ OCR evaluates whether your complaint falls within its authority and notifies both you and the school if it opens an investigation. OCR acts as a neutral fact-finder, reviewing documents, conducting interviews, and sometimes visiting the school.⁵

If OCR finds that the school violated federal civil rights law, it negotiates a voluntary resolution agreement requiring specific corrective steps. The school has to follow through, and OCR monitors compliance. Schools that refuse to cooperate risk losing federal funding.⁵

Retaliation Protections

Federal law prohibits schools from retaliating against anyone who files a discrimination or harassment complaint, and that protection reaches past the student who was targeted. Parents, guardians, siblings, teachers, counselors, and any third party who advocates for a student’s rights are covered.⁶

Retaliation means any intimidation, threat, coercion, or adverse action that would discourage a reasonable person from exercising their civil rights. If a teacher suddenly grades your child more harshly after you file, or the school excludes your child from activities they used to participate in, that can qualify. Protections apply under Title VI, Title IX, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act.⁶

If you experience retaliation after filing a Respect for All report, document what changed and when, then report it to both the school and OCR. A retaliation complaint to OCR follows the same 180-day deadline as a discrimination complaint.

1
NYC Public Schools. Respect for All Family Resource
2
NYC Public Schools. Respect for All Bullying Prevention and Intervention
3
New York City Department of Education. A-832 Student-to-Student Discrimination, Harassment, Intimidation, and/or Bullying
4
U.S. Department of Education. OCR Discrimination Complaint Form
5
U.S. Department of Education. How the Office for Civil Rights Handles Complaints
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U.S. Department of Education. Retaliation Discrimination