By Flora Davies and Shivani Parthipun, Year 10 Journalist Leaders

During lockdown, social media and gaming was a vital part of teenagers’ lives. It enabled them to keep in touch with one another during a difficult time. This positive impact of social media and gaming continues to grow as older generations begin to understand the positive impact it can have on our generation. In this article, we will describe how we are using gaming to make a difference.

The stereotype around social media is that it is dangerous, addictive and portrays an unrealistic picture of people’s lives. Gaming has also been surrounded by a similar stereotype, as unproductive and encouraging violent behaviour e.g. Call of Duty. However, when speaking to teenagers, the National Literacy Trust and Association of UK Entertainment found that in a survey of 5,000 11-16 year olds, all identified positive effects of gaming e.g. 63% said that they get involved in extra activities related to video games that is beneficial e.g. writing top tip blogs for other gamers. 

So for our year’s charity event this month, we decided to harness the increasing popularity of gaming and host an ‘Among Us’ tournament. ‘Among Us’ is a game that became especially popular during lockdown as it enabled friends to work together and stay connected.  Due to the game’s popularity we thought that this provided a great opportunity to fundraise.

During 2020, charities have become increasingly underfunded. The Times Newspaper found that there is a £10 billion funding shortfall, because they are unable to run their usual fundraising events. Many charities risk becoming bankrupt and thus 60,000 jobs will be lost. 

To do our bit, the charity we chose to raise money for was the Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust. This is a charity that tackles inequality in many forms, for example working with schools to encourage and inspire students from BAME backgrounds. We chose this charity as a year group because we all support the Black Lives Matter movement but many of us were unable to attend rallies and marches due to Covid restrictions. Our Among Us tournament was a great way to allow the entire school to take part, generate more donations and stay safe from Covid-19 all at once.

Finally, we wanted to provide a fun event that everybody could attend to relax from the end of term chaos whilst raising funds for an important cause. Overall we raised valuable funds for the charity (total to be confirmed) and found that gaming could really be used for good.