Cyberbullying in education raises concern

AFRICAN schools across the continent increasingly join and use the technological revolution to improve education.

- RUDI BUYS

At the same time a movement is growing to limit web access for learners, also in South Africa. Access to social media is the crux of the concern. Along with access to unlimited amounts of all matter of information comes pictures and private details of any and everyone of their peers and strangers.

Access leaves young users open to cyberbullying - to be bullied and become bullies. Add free versions of AI to the mix and a powerful tool falls into a child’s hands to alter what his peers see and assume as truth about others and by implication tell others how they must respond to the victim. Of course, this is so not only for young users, but all other groups of people. Most concerning, however, is that this mix of cyber tools make underaged children powerful producers of public narratives of others’ lives.

Hence the concern for access to social media that rule the lives of children at home and at school. Not even the possible misuse of access for AI to prop up the work and academic performance of learners, and of teachers — the possibility of no authentic learning taking place, can match the concern for “weaponised social media.” This is not a recent or new problem, as a recent case in a local school illustrates.

In this case, bullies circulated social media pictures of girls with their faces photoshopped onto lewd naked bodies. Without doubt an instance of premeditated and targeted bullying, the school, through its governing body, started an investigation and registered the case for further action with the Western Cape Education Department.