Hong Kong protests: secondary school pupils take charge of their own strikes using social media
- Teenagers set up networks to plan their actions as part of school boycott push
- University student unions encouraging younger pupils to organise activities by themselves and to make their own decisions
Thousands of students from 10 universities and at least 180 secondary schools are expected to join the class boycott, which will kick off next week when the new academic term starts, in a bid to pressure the government to meet protesters’ demands, including the complete withdrawal of the bill and an inquiry into police’s use of force.
While university students organise through unions, at least two platforms have been set up for secondary school pupils to communicate and support each other, including “Student strike on September 2”, co-founded by student groups Demovanile, Anti-Foo and Demosisto, which evolved from the disbanded Scholarism.
A second platform, Hong Kong Students’ Strike Alliance, is composed of Studentlocalism, Hong Kong Teen Anti Tyranny, Hong Kong Student Power, and pupils from different schools.
Groups such as Demosisto and tertiary students said they would help younger pupils by providing resources including leaflets and templates of parents’ letters – which were expected to be required for them to join the boycotts.