Several Tennessee schools join social media lawsuit

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WDEF) — Many Tennessee school systems have joined a lawsuit against social media companies, seeking protection for their students. One of those school system is local.

Thirty-three total school systems in Tennessee have filed lawsuits against these platforms, according to the law firm.

Locally, Bledsoe County Schools has joined in on the lawsuits. “The lawsuits seek actionable accountability, tools and resources to address the lack of protections, monitors, controls and cooperation to protect children,” according to the involved law firms.

The lawsuit is targeting Meta, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, Google, WhatsApp and YouTube.

They say this lawsuit is due to a growing mental health crisis among students.

“With the ever-increasing use of social media among students, we’ve seen negative effects in the classroom, including disruptions, mental health issues and safety concerns,” Chuck Carter, director of Sullivan County Schools, said. “We’re charged with educating, preparing and protecting students and consider the requests in the lawsuit to be common sense solutions that could make a positive impact to combat these issues.”

Edit: This article previously included information that Cleveland City Schools was involved in the social media lawsuit. However, the school system has informed us that they are not involved.

The law firm informed us of a mistake, and that only 33 schools have officially confirmed their participation in the lawsuit. We previously reported there were 36 schools.