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My day job is at a large (over 4000 student) high school and we have geofences blocking YikYak from our area (Snapchat and Twitter were also recently blocked from our wi-fi). At such a large school, I have seen kids use social media as a positive way to connect-- i.e. we have our own "Humans of..." page on Facebook.
Particularly working at an urban school with a diverse cross-section of kids, I do worry about how quickly an app like this can drive students apart rather than helping them connect.
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@erin_alexa_ How do you feel about the possibility that banning an app enhances its allure to young people? I know it would for me. I've found a lot of the content quite objectionable--and hard to believe--but it feels like a ban or a geofence is a high tech way to treat the symptoms, that does nothing to address the root cause.
@erin_alexa_@Chikodi Even if this app was banned from the App Store, another would quickly surface. Though this app is not necessarily completely ethical, teens still eat it up. That's also why teens use ask.fm and Yik Yak.
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@Chikodi Honestly I want to go on Twitter more now that I can't at work, so I'm sure it could add an allure for them.
I agree that geofencing is a high tech way to treat a symptom and does not address a root cause, but at times that's necessary. We have 4,000 kids and 8 security guards (and 1 police officer). Security can't be everywhere and having more ways to cause issues just isn't good.
The worst social media caused issue I know of was last year when a student left the school after he wrote a rant on Facebook about a severely injured football player (hospitalized and will never fully recover) and later feared retaliation from the player's teammates-- I'm sure other social media events have caused other issues.
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@Chikodi@tzhongg I totally get that apps like this will be a reality.
I showed the app's iTunes page to about 10 kids during lunch (I work in the library and therefore have more downtime with kids than others) to see what they thought of it. Every student said something along the lines of "man, that's just a bad idea" in regards to the anonymity. That said, if it became popular at my school, I imagine about two-thirds of those I showed the app would use it.
I'm happy that the app now includes an abuse reporting button-- but wonder what follow-up exists. Like what type of threats (school shooting? suicide? etc) would and should be forwarded to district/ school admin?
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@erin_alexa_ I'm glad your kids showed you how much smarter they are than they are given credit.
"Since launch, users from more than 14,000 different high schools across the country have already downloaded the app, says Levy. For comparison, there are roughly 24,500 public high schools in total in the United States. More than 100,000 people have downloaded the app"
Intrigued how they spread through so many schools so quickly
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