Social media is the biggest hot spot for bullies to gain power.  Whether it’s Twitter, Facebook, messaging apps, anyone can open social media and negatively attack anyone.  In this case, my high school, experienced the app Yik Yak, as a negative target.  This app proved how ruthless any school can become when being able to post things anonymously online.

At my school, things spread easily. Therefore, the app Yik Yak was downloaded by almost all the students at my school within seconds.  Yik Yak is a social media app that allows anyone to post anything anonymously online.

The Yik Yak app became popular at our school in November.  One day in November, I remember my friends and I downloading the app during lunch when we heard about it through the boys table behind us.  We made an account and the app linked us to the “Hartland” area, where we saw everyone in our district making anonymous posts.  It started off with funny posts about school and the general tweets you see on Twitter.  However, after one post about a teacher at our school, within seconds, everyone started to anonymously post rude things about students, teachers, and even personal information about people at the school.

The app was like a paper shredder, people posting things in and shredding peoples feelings. The posts were so rude and mean that one of my best friends started crying because of post about her. Anyone could become a bully without people knowing who they are.

Days later, since students kept refreshing and posting on their Yik Yak feed, someone anonymously reported the app as being disrespectful and hurtful to students and teachers.  The school staff got involved and blocked the app on the school’s wifi.

Eventually, everyone simmered down.  The school’s response helped students become more confident and fight back the bullies by creating upbringing messages and activities throughout the school. The school started a NoH8 week where during one week they did things each day to make people’s day better. For example, they put messages on whiteboards in the hall, posted hundreds of sticky post-it notes with positive messages on every locker in the school, posted colorful, and positive signs all around the school. 

This NoH8 week helped us as students grow more as a family and to understand the effects of bullying.  This week not only strengthened us as a whole, but it also gave us a perspective on bullying.