WCED’s “Raise your voice. Not your phone campaign” wins bronze and silver awards at IAB bookmark awards

Statement by Minister Debbie Schäfer, Minister of Education Western Cape

I am delighted that the WCED’s “Raise Your Voice. Not Your Phone” campaign has won a silver and a bronze award at the IAB Bookmark Awards on Thursday last week.

The IAB Bookmark Awards, an IAB SA initiative, celebrated its 11th year of rewarding excellence in digital marketing and recognising the powerful impact this has on the overall marketing mix.

The Bookmark Awards sets the benchmark for tech, digital and cutting edge innovation. The award winning work inspires and educates the industry about the power to build brands through creative and high impact digital executions that deliver measurable results. 

The WCED’s “Raise Your Voice. Not Your Phone” Campaign won a Silver Award under the category “Content Strategy” and a Bronze Award under the category “Public Service and NPO Platforms”.  The campaign was also nominated as a finalist in 7 categories.

  Given the prevalence of bullying in our schools, the WCED in August 2018, embarked on a campaign to highlight the effects of bullying on learners, as well as to draw attention to the fact that learners who film, post or distribute videos are also participating in the bullying. 

The campaign first involves the filming of a fake bullying incident in a school yard. It ends with the simple message: “Raise your voice, not your phone”.

The viewer is then taken to 5 constructed questions that leads the reader to the realisation that learners are also participating in bullying by filming the incident, rather than intervening in order to bring an end to the abuse.

See here - http://www.wcg-antibullying.co.za/

A second video was then created, which involved the participation of random learners from schools across the metro, who were asked questions in an interview. A psychologist was asked to show each learner the first video and a number of questions were posed thereafter. They were not briefed on the content. Their reactions are all real.

Just see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBOr46mWHQs 

The video exposes how learners don’t necessarily understand the implications of filming or distributing content across social media, and how their actions are just as bad as the bully concerned.

It is a powerful message that not only reveals the pain one can cause, but also the pain that many have suffered. 

The campaign leads learners to various pages of support or advice on how to intervene when bullying occurs. 

The campaign also provides tips on what one can do to help victims that are being bullied, as well as the types of support that are available for learners experiencing such abuse.  

Unfortunately, many cases of bullying go unreported and the WCED is therefore not able to intervene.  It is so important to run advocacy and awareness campaigns such as this regarding the dangers of bullying, and how to combat it.

I am delighted that the campaign has been recognised by the IAB Bookmark Awards. I must thank Carl Wastie and Paxton Fielies who partnered with us on this campaign. They certainly helped raise the profile of the campaign and drew much needed attention to the dangers and risks associated with bullying in our schools.

Media Enquiries:
Jessica Shelver
Tel: 021 483 6570
Cell: 076 175 0663
E-mail: Jessica.Shelver@westerncape.gov.za