Our Youth

TMLA Helps Grade-School Students Understand the World of Social Media

April 10, 2013

The Mary Louis Academy (TMLA), Jamaica Estates, sponsored its third annual Delete Day to increase awareness of the influence of social media.

TMLA students led the event by presenting information and facilitating discussions. They also trained their younger peers on how to conduct a Delete Day.

High school students from The Mary Louis Academy lead a group session with grade school students from St. Francis de Sales School, Belle Harbor, to help the students become responsible cyber citizens.
High school students from The Mary Louis Academy lead a group session with grade school students from St. Francis de Sales School, Belle Harbor, to help the students become responsible cyber citizens.

More than 75 boys and girls and their teachers from the Catholic elementary schools and academies in Brooklyn and Queens attended the event. Students learned the consequences of irresponsible use of social media and how to make certain that they present their best self through their social media activities.

The event aimed to pose the question: What are you saying about yourself through the way you handle social media? During the program, participants reviewed what they have posted on their social media accounts such as Twitter, Instagram, SnapChat and Facebook. They were also asked to analyze how they post and send to others’ accounts. This led to an examination of how social media can play a negative role through cyber bullying and how to make peer pressure work for the better.

The students also learned how to develop appropriate e-mail and usernames.

After discussion and review, students cleaned up their accounts, changed settings and deleted inappropriate posts, pictures, nicknames and more.

St. Rose of Lima School in Rockaway Park brought 12 students and three teachers to the event. “Our students and their teachers were in awe of Delete Day,” said Assistant Principal Bridget Murphy. “All the teachers and students want to adapt this in some way to our needs here at St. Rose.”

“I was very surprised what I learned about Instagram,” said seventh grader Sebastian Rosas. “I did not realize that my pictures could be used anywhere. I will never use Instagram again.”

Eighth grader Jontele Wilford said she learned that by downloading the Facebook application on a smartphone, all the privacy settings on the user’s computer are changed. She said she would go home and fix all her settings.

“I learned that everything you post, even after you delete it, can be found,” said eighth grader Marianny Fernandez.

“I didn’t realize that 40 percent of Facebook profiles are false,” she said.

St. Rose teachers were also eager to express their support for the event.

“I was glad that the training stressed the mistake of following strangers,” said Kim Wilson, a grade-eight homeroom teacher. “It is important that students realize the message their profile may be sending.”