Newfound Student Voice at Athenian: The Story Behind @athenianprotectors

By Kati Wilkes

The summer of 2020 was filled with uncertainty and apprehension due to the coronavirus, but that didn’t stop Athenian students from coming together to try and make social change. 

Student voice is constantly encouraged at Athenian, but doesn’t mean that it’s always heard. With a rise in general student activism and newfound energy to enact change, two anonymous students created two different Instagram accounts for students to use to voice their thoughts, opinions, concerns, and proposals for change at Athenian. The first account, @athenianprotectors, was focused on giving students a platform to talk about issues, both inside and outside Athenian, related to sexual assault and harassment.

“When I started to see other schools and individuals speaking up about their personal experiences, I realized that our community needed a similar platform. We needed a place where people can be supported and feel comfortable sharing their stories,” says the creator of the initial account (@athenianprotectors).

Anonymous platforms, just like the two at Athenian, have become increasingly popular on high school and college campuses all across the country. Most notably, in 2016 students at Harvard created an anonymous app called Campfire that served a similar purpose. According to The Harvard Crimson, the student-run newspaper, the forum was created to foster campus-wide discussion about classes, social issues, and allegation of sexual assault. 

As of now, the @athenianprotectors account has posted around one hundred anonymous submissions; none of which have any names or information listed that tie the accusations to specific individuals. However, it was noted recently at a community meeting that most students were able to figure out who the submissions were talking about based on their own knowledge and experiences. 

The initial account was met with some backlash from members of the student body. There was some questioning of the validity of certain allegations that were posted as well as submissions that tried to undermine the seriousness of the platform. The administration has also voiced some of their own concerns about the forum.

The student leading @athenianprotectors says, “There was a lot of positive feedback towards this platform that reinforced the need for students to have a safe space to get support. As expected, there were also some mixed responses from the student body, as it is hard for a site like this to meet everyone’s needs.”

The platform, as of recently, has become a point of controversy within the school. Administration members have made statements to students stating that due to the anonymity of the forum, it was difficult to do thorough follow-up on the content of the postings.

“Things were being posted but nothing was being brought to the school. The school wasn’t being informed, it was being posted on a site, so the school couldn’t do anything with the information,” says Amy Wintermeyer, Head of Upper School.

The administration continues to urge students to use more official channels of communication with the school itself if they want to report anything. More information about those specifics can be found in the student handbook, or students can reach out to the administration directly.

“I worry about kids needing help and not getting help because it’s being done on a site and not being reported to adults who can help,” adds Wintermeyer.

For some students, that wasn’t a good enough answer. They want the concerns they voiced to be acted upon. The community is attempting to find a way that everyone in the Athenian community, both students and administrators, can work together to resolve any possible issues. 

The second account, @athenianchange, was started shortly after the first account began posting because the creator wanted a platform where students could talk in the same open manner about issues other than sexual assault and harassment. 

“I saw how the first account was causing people to speak up more publicly about stuff that I’ve been hearing about for years, so I wanted to make another platform to start a discussion about other issues at school like sexism, racism, xenophobia, etc,” the account creator said. 

The @athenianchange account has nearly 140 posts, though it should be noted that there were nearly twice that amount of submissions. Most of those were either duplicates, responses to other posts, attacks on people with no basis, or threats towards the owner of the account.

“I only really wanted to post things that were productive and could actually spark some conversation at school. I, by no means, censored people I didn’t agree with, I just didn’t think it was in the account's best interest to post submissions that were blatant jokes or just complaints about me and the account,” adds the account creator.

Somewhere along the way, the account owner asked students to respond in the comments below previous posts if they wanted to make a comment of any sort or agree/disagree. They hoped that by doing that, they could better start a conversation and make it easier to have a real discussion with someone, instead of just submitting anonymous responses. Not much has been done formally to address the more general issues and ideas that were shared on @athenianchange.

As the summer came to an end, some students wanted to continue the conversations that were started via the two accounts. Tess Shotland ‘22, the founder of the new student group, “Uncensored,” (no affiliation to the old uncensored meetings) hopes that by bringing more students together to talk in a school environment can help make some change. 

Shotland says, “I wanted to [start uncensored] because I didn’t want to be anonymous. I wanted to be able to talk to other people about what I was saying instead of just posting it and being done because that wouldn’t really do anything.”

The conversation has just begun, and she hopes that by creating this new platform even more students will be able to speak their minds and really be heard. The group is currently working to create a safe space for students to gather and share their ideas and opinions about current issues at Athenian. Their hope is to connect with Forum and Community Meeting leaders to create a plan of action. 

“It's harder to say no to a group of students than just one student,” says Shotland.