Everyone likes to receive a compliment, right? Well, the app TBH has recently been bought by Facebook and is about brightening your day by giving and receiving compliments from kids at your high school.
Computer Science and Math teacher Melissa Makovsky has been at H-F for seven years and teaches real world application of software problems. She said that the app could be beneficial to one’s confidence.
“As long as the comments cannot be negative or seen negatively, I think that this is a good app to foster positive self -esteem,” Makovsky said.
She affirms that positivity and one’s self-esteem should continue to prosper with the occurrence of TBH.
“It sounds like a really nice tool to provide positive comments to students,” Makovsky said.
Social worker Lauren White said she thinks TBH will be a wonderful, kind app as many social media platforms can produce pessimistic attitudes.
“I feel like a lot of social media is very negative or can be judgmental and harsh. And then you’re flipping it to give someone a compliment, showing that you care about them,” White said.
She says that peoples’ days brighten and gain more confidence by little things.
“The main things I feel are key for everybody, teenagers or adults, is building positive connections,” White said. “And taking care of yourself, treating yourself kind, talking good to yourself, making sure you have a balance, so you’re not running yourself ragged.”
TBH could possibly help build connections, as you can reply to the comments you receive to find out who gave you the compliment.
“A lot of people I feel put up a mask and say that they’re happy and everything’s great, but inside is feeling a different way,” White said.
Junior Ethan Richert has had TBH for about a month now and he said this app could be a motivation for the students and provide a kind aspect of school.
“I feel this could have some benefits socially for individuals who are lacking confidence. Although, I can see issues on the opposite end of the spectrum where it could possibly degrade students’ self-esteem,” Richert said.
Developing an app can be very time consuming, but overall the amount of time an app takes to program depends on its complexity and how much logic it requires to function.
“It usually starts off with a small planning phase where you plan out the functions and logic of the program,” Richert said. “You then start a programming phase where you finish a bulk of the actual programming. You then end with a phase of fixing any errors in your code to make it more efficient.”
He said he enjoys the options given as none can be wrongly applied by someone.
“There are no wrong choices, since most of the compliments and questions apply to multiple people,” Richert said.