CHARLESTON, W.Va. –During the 2025-26 school year, students in grades three through 12 learned about online and social media safety as a result of legislation passed by the West Virginia Legislature.
The S.W.A.T. (Safety While Accessing Technology) bill was passed during the 2024 legislative session. It required the state Department of Education to develop a S.W.A.T. education program for students in those grade levels for the 2025-26 school year.
The program includes instruction on the safe and responsible use of social networking websites, the risks of sharing personal information online, the importance of establishing open communication with a trusted adult, how to recognize, avoid and report suspicious, potentially dangerous or illegal communications, and the resources and assistance programs available to students.
State Superintendent of Schools Michele Blatt appeared on MetroNews Midday earlier this month to discuss the bill and its implementation.
Blatt said schools previously held internet safety assemblies, but those sessions were not as in-depth as the new program. She said the state was also able to partner with the Safe Surfin’ Foundation’s Cyber S.W.A.T. program, a national nonprofit focused on internet safety.
She said passage of the bill allowed the state to go more in-depth in teaching students about internet safety.
“We were able to get more detailed into some of the real concerns just around social media and communicating with those that you don’t through online platforms,” Blatt said.
Blatt said the foundation and the department were able to partner with Skyll, an online software platform designed to educate students and promote internet safety.
She said Skyll features an AI-powered interactive movie game that allows students to log in and become the main character in a story. Throughout the game, students face scenario-based situations and make decisions, with the outcomes determined by those choices. Students also receive guidance explaining why certain decisions may be unsafe or inappropriate.
“They’re able to navigate challenges, get feedback on the choices they make, and see how the situations could end if they chose a different pathway,” she said.
She said this approach to online safety education gives students the opportunity to see firsthand the importance of situations and their decisions.
“This encourages them to really get engaged and really understand the importance of their decisions they make but then also the importance of making sure they talk to a trusted adult if they’re in a situation they can’t get out of,” Blatt said.