One type of video is repeating itself on Instagram: a person talks to the camera and then has ice water poured onto their head. As part of the video, the person nominates friends to join the trend. These videos aren’t a resurfacing of the 2014 ice bucket challenge in support of ALS, they are a part of a new ice bucket challenge from University of South Carolina’s Mental Illness Discussion Club supporting Active Minds, which raises awareness for mental health.
The trend has spread rapidly, including at U-High, because of the phenomenon of people nominating multiple others, multiplying the trend with each new video.
While most people nominate friends, junior Danny Aronsohn took the step of nominating U-High principal Martin Woods.
“Me and my buddies were figuring out who I should nominate and most of my friends had already done it,” Danny said. “I was talking to my friend, Spencer [Davis] and we both decided that it would be a cool and funny idea if we challenged Mr. Woods, despite not being able to tag him on Instagram,” Danny said.
By participating in the challenge, Mr. Woods hopes to bring light to destigmatizing the idea of mental health.
“We know that our students are dealing with it a lot,” Mr. Woods said. “The adults are dealing with it … so I just want to encourage kids to speak out and to feel comfortable in doing that.”
The day after Mr. Woods posted his ice bucket challenge video, in which he nominated Lab middle school principal Zackary Livingston, a group of Lab eighth graders helped Mr. Livingston complete the challenge. Both principals’ videos were reposted by Lab’s Instagram account. On Mr. Woods’ own Instagram account, the video reached over 70,000 views, extending his message far beyond the Lab community.
While the original purpose of the ice bucket challenge was to support mental health awareness for mental health awareness month, the challenge has started to veer from its original purpose.
“I think there definitely are kids who are really just excited to dump water on themselves,” Danny said. “I think at the same time there are a lot of people that are taking the challenge to heart and understanding the meaning behind it.”
Even though the meaning of the ice bucket challenge has not fully stayed true to USCMind’s original intent, Mr. Woods hopes his video will bring out a positive response in the students, leading them to understand the true meaning of the ice bucket challenge.
“It may resonate with a lot of students as something silly that the principal did,” Mr. Woods said, “but I really hope that we have brought to light a very important topic.”
