Thanks to Vesna Sholz Talbot and Caitlin Bain at Hawkesdale P-12 College for this week’s blog post
The #girltakeover event focusing on safety in the age of instant content was held in Melbourne at the Facebook/Instagram office on Safer Internet Day, 7th February, 2017. 
The event included year 9/10 girls from various schools, some from metropolitan Melbourne and others from further away. Facebook/Instagram, in partnership with the Department of Education sponsored the event. Project Rockit and Sticks’n Stones created a variety of tasks for everyone to participate in such as discussions about areas of cyber safety, games that encouraged social interaction and fun activities.
Our highlight was getting involved in specific discussions with other students from different schools. One of the main topics of our discussion were adults on social media and what role they play as parents. We rewrote Internet Safety Rules that were originally written by an adult, were put in a positive way and in the students’ own language, knowing that teenagers would now take greater notice compared to the negatives tone used previously.
Other highlights included:
- feeling valued as girls and students, and being encouraged to share our opinions on some of our favourite social media outlets
- the rainbow cupcakes and doughnuts for morning tea (complete with social media icons)
- the amazing view from the building (15th storey)
- the safe and open environment.
- meeting and interacting with other people
- the very energetic hosts who were highly involved
Our main take away from the day is that when talking about the safety of deletable media, it does not have to be negative, boring and unappearling to teenagers. In fact it can appeal to teens, in a fun way that doesn’t seem like a punishment.
We have the power to be the change!
