High School Student Develops App To Try And Tackle Bullying
Millions of kids are bullied in school every year. Some survey's suggest that it might be as many as 90 percent of elementary school children who get bullied.
For those in grades 6-10, it's estimated that roughly 1-3 Americans will be affected by bullying.
For those being bullied, this includes being made fun of, insulted, called names, made the subject of rumors, physically assaulted by being pushed or shoved, slapped, or spit on, having objects thrown at them. Many students get excluded from group activities on purpose, some threatened with harm, and others who have their property destroyed.
There's a high likelihood that you yourself might have been bullied, known someone who was bullied, or witnessed an act of bullying at school. It gets so bad for some students that they opt to miss school because they don't want to face the torment, and some are pushed to the point of taking their own lives.
We've been funneling tons of effort and resources into a myriad of different anti-bullying campaigns over the years. There are a great deal of different anti-bullying speeches that have taken place, many efforts have been tried to promote the message that bullying isn't okay.
Heck, for what it's worth we've even got National Bullying Prevention Month, and World Bullying Prevention Day, but yet the problem continues to persist.
The problem of bullying has fueled a number of families to look elsewhere for their education, whether that be virtual avenues or homeschooling. Previous studies have found that bullying is a growing issue for parents who are choosing virtual charter schools for their kids.
One high school student from California, Natalie Hampton, released her app over a year ago to try and help the issue.
Currently, it's got over 100,000 users and being used in at least 8 different countries.
At some schools where they don't allow cellphones, the new app has even inspired students to create a Sit With Us club that welcomes those who don't have anyone or anywhere to go sit at lunch.
And Sit With Us isn't the only one out there. There are others, like the Anonymous Alerts that works as a platform for people to report bullying at schools. The app has already been accepted for use in more than 30 different school districts in the United States.
Another app, known as Brighten, developed by student Austin Kevitch, helps students send anonymous compliments to one another. It was released back in 2015 and has already been downloaded more than 1 million times.
And after being inspired by the story of the 15 yr old Amanda Todd who took her life after extensive online bullying, it prompted Todd Schobel to come up with STOPit.
This anti-bullying app also seeks to erode the fear associated with reporting bullying incidents. It's been on the market for 4+ years now and has already been downloaded more than 3+ million times. It's also being used in 5 different countries.
Some schools that use the apps have reported that they've seen a downward trend in incidents of bullying after they were introduced.
Unfortunately, simply repeating the message that bullying is bad over and over just isn't working the way that people would like it to. The problem still continues today, but it's inspiring to see so many young students looking for creative solutions to try and address what they see as a big problem in their school.
And for the families who don't want to take the risk, there are always other educational avenues for them to turn to in order to try and get their needs met.
Pics:
Pixabay
via bps.org.uk
pixabay
via radiofreephoenix.com
Dribble via guruzfather.com
Sources:
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Healthday/story?id=4506556
https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=719
http://www.businessinsider.com/staggering-facts-about-bullying-in-america-2013-10
https://infotel.ca/newsitem/us-child-suicide-bullying/cp1217315814
http://www.cnn.com/2018/01/16/health/ohio-suicide-cluster/index.html
http://fox8.com/2018/01/15/perry-township-police-continue-to-investigate-factors-in-recent-teen-suicides/
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/oklahoma/articles/2018-01-10/survey-bullying-leads-students-to-enroll-in-virtual-schools
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/a-more-perfect-union-sit-with-us-app-unites-students-fights-bullying/
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/anonymous-alerts-anti-bullying-mobile-app-is-implemented-by-over-32-texas-school-districts-in-under-60-days-300534580.html
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/anti-bullying-apps-will-fail-unless-society-takes-action-critics-say-1.1363665
https://www.thestar.com/yourtoronto/education/2017/02/28/app-lets-students-make-anonymous-reports-about-bullying-unsafe-behaviour.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/anti-bullying-app-brighten_us_58853303e4b070d8cad367e7
https://patch.com/new-jersey/bernardsville-bedminster/anti-bullying-app-making-positive-changes-nj-schools
I was always bullied in high school everyday and teased that I was “ugly” I wish I took a step forth but this kid is smart and he’s going to change peoples lives forever
You know, when I read the title to this post my first thought was that it was stupid. How could an app prevent bullying? It sounded ridiculous. I was definitely bullied when I was a kid by my friend group until I eventually just hung out with myself for most of my high school years. It wasn't until I joined the Navy that I found a group of guys that I really connected with that gave me confidence. I think the idea behind this app is really good. If back then I had just been able to find a different group of people that were actually decent human beings, maybe things would be different. I think it's great that Natalie took the initiative do do something about this in a really smart way.
Thanks for sharing this awesome imformation @doitvoluntarily ! Three thumbs up for those who stand up to bullies !! and its so great to hear that schools are adopting these apps that students themselves help create in finding creative solutions !! This has always been a major problem in and out of school that needs to come to an end !! And this is a great start !! upped and resteemed !👍👍👍
What brilliant kids! Good to see some young kids being wise and mature.
I wonder how the random compliment app is kept from being misused. Does it let people send typed messages or do you pick from a list of pre-given messages? Cuz in the case of the former, it might be misused and used for insults possibly.
Great post @doitvoluntarily. It is so sad to think that teens lose their lives because of bullying. In my days in high school that was the late 70's bullying was unheard of. Even when my kids was finishing high school in the late 90's, they never complained about bullying. It is very important for the parent of teenagers to be very "tuned in" with their kids to notice the slightest problem. I also hear stories on the news nowadays of schoolkids attacking each other in school, to this tendency have also now spread to South African schools. Thank you for bringing this to everyone's attention.
As someone who lived with various degrees of bullying for my entire 12 years of school, I'm always ready to support any anti-bullying initiative. Bullying leaves scars you may not even know are there till the show up in unfortunate ways, many years later.
Anyway, wish something like "sit with us" had been around when I was a kid... might have made life a little less miserable. In the meantime, I just hope it helps a few struggling kids.
Very great students and excellent apps. Hopefully can solve the problem of bullying on students in school. Very good article and very interesting to read. Thank you very much for sharing @doitvoluntarily.
Bullying is not a good habit though I must admit me and my friends used to do it during elementary days. Well, we were just kids then :)
Kids will usually act a lot like they see the adults in their lives act towards other people. The problem is kids are the ones who get in trouble, then they get confused because school is telling them the behavior is bad, but they see adults still acting this way outside of school.
Awesome post bro, shared + upvoted.