Two insights drove our strategy; young people’s moral compass doesn’t fully develop until adulthood and current anti-bullying efforts focus on awareness and reporting abuse after the fact. By then, the damage is already done. The opportunity lay in creating an educational tool to prevent bullying behaviour before it happens.

We created Reword, a real-time alert for online bullying. Reword is an educational tool that helps develop young people’s moral compass when they first become active on social media.

A simple JavaScript tool that integrates with social and messaging platforms, Reword detects insults using regex matching as a child types. When a match is found, the child is alerted with a red strikethrough, instantly interrupting behaviour and prompting them to reconsider their words.

Children are encouraged to become co-authors by adding their own bullying terms, helping Reword recognize evolving language and slang.

Reword is a red line alerting users of bullying in real-time. This intuitive, non-intrusive symbol encourages users to reconsider their words.

After a successful pilot program, we launched our in-school program and made Reword available online as a free Google Chrome extension.

To engage Protectors emotionally, we ran an integrated campaign calling for support. Featuring shareable content of real kids, parents and experts, it highlighted the problem and presented Reword as a solution. The campaign asked Protectors to install the tool at home and in schools.

We targeted youth in schools and on social media, inviting them to directly interact with the tool and add new bullying terms. Being co-authors compelled them to take a stand against cyberbullying.

We directed people to our website, designed with a linear structure to introduce the tool. Our objectives for installations, interaction and social support guided the narrative and hierarchy, which varied across devices.

Within six weeks, we saw a distinct impact on behaviour. 84% of insults detected were reworded. And we saw an incredible 67% reduction in bullying behaviour per user.

Our call to action resonated, generating over 20,000 insult submissions from young people, creating millions of new combinations.

Reword showed clear universal relevance, garnering global coverage on CNN, Mashable and Wired – contributing to 150 million media impressions – and personal messages from around the world.

To date, Reword has been introduced to over 300 schools nationwide and installed on 1,045,146

computers. With public support from federal and state education ministers, Headspace is committed to implementing Reword in every school nationwide.

First six weeks:

• 84% of insults reworded

• 67% reduction in bullying behaviour per user

• 20,0000+ contributed insults

• 150,000+ installs

• 150 million media impressions

Reword is changing online bullying behaviour, creating a new generation that respects each other – online and in real life.