Teens are using Social Media to pick and plan school fights, writes Hechinger’s Katy Reckdahl, reporting from New Orleans.
A “huge proportion” of fights have roots in Social media, social worker Osha Sempel told Reckdahl.
Beldon Batiste, 15, stands in the doorway to his home, looking out at the street where he was injured in a fight ignited by online posts. Photo: Sophia Germer
Last year, some New Orleans educators wondered why fights were starting “as soon as students got off the buses in the morning,” Reckdahl writes. “Then it became clear: when teens feud on social media at night, they arrive at school ready to fight.”
Mondays are a big problem, said Jennifer Pagan, a mediator at West Jefferson High School in a New Orleans suburb. “Kids get on the sofa on Friday and spend the weekend on Snapchat or Kik — their weapons of mass destruction.”
New Orleans PeaceKeepers maintains a “Squash the Beef” hotline. “School becomes the battleground,” said co-founder Willie Muhammad, a teacher. “If someone makes an ugly remark online and an argument ensues, one kid will tell another, ‘Okay, when we get to school tomorrow, I’m going to handle it.”
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