In February, Patrice Motz, a seasoned Spanish teacher at Great Valley Middle School in Malvern, Pennsylvania, was alerted by a colleague about potential trouble brewing. Eighth graders at her school had created TikTok accounts impersonating teachers. Motz, unfamiliar with TikTok, set up an account and found a fake profile under her name.
The fake account featured a real photo of Motz at the beach with her family, overlaid with a disturbing text in Spanish suggesting inappropriate behavior. This was just the beginning; about 20 educators—roughly a quarter of the school’s faculty—discovered similar fake accounts filled with offensive content, including racist memes, homophobia, and fabricated sexual liaisons among teachers. These fraudulent accounts quickly attracted hundreds of students.
In response, the school district briefly suspended several students, and the principal addressed the eighth-grade class about their behavior. For teachers like Motz, the incident was devastating. The online harassment left many educators feeling demoralized and concerned about the impact of social media on students’ empathy. Some teachers are now hesitant to discipline students, and others find it challenging to continue teaching.
Motz, who has taught at the school for 14 years, expressed disbelief at the students’ actions. The Great Valley incident is the first known group TikTok attack of this nature by middle schoolers on their teachers in the U.S., marking a significant escalation in how students use social media to harass educators.
This incident reflects broader concerns about students’ use of online tools and their impact on the classroom. Some states and districts have restricted or banned student cellphone use in schools to curb peer harassment and cyberbullying. Social media platforms have normalized aggressive, anonymous posts, which some students now use against adults.
The Great Valley School District acknowledged the issue, describing it as a gross misuse of social media that profoundly affected their staff. Two female students later posted an “apology” video on TikTok, claiming the fake accounts were meant as jokes and accusing teachers of overreacting. They admitted they never intended for the situation to escalate.
A TikTok spokesperson stated that the platform prohibits misleading behavior, including impersonation without disclosure. TikTok’s U.S.-based security team verifies identities in such cases before removing accounts.
The fake TikTok accounts disrupted the school community. Some teachers, already familiar with other social media platforms, had not used TikTok before. The morning after Motz discovered her impersonator, the disparaging TikToks were widely known among students. Teachers reported students using phones to mock them with references to TikTok.
Students had sourced images from the school’s website and personal photos from teachers’ classrooms or online. They created memes by manipulating these photos with offensive text. Unlike high-tech deepfakes, these low-tech “cheapfakes” still managed to cause significant harm.
The fake accounts varied in content, from seemingly benign to highly sexualized and offensive posts. Some teachers, like Shawn Whitelock, who had a fake account featuring his wedding photo with an inappropriate caption, felt their reputations were severely damaged.
The school district’s response included an eighth-grade assembly on responsible technology use. However, legal constraints limited their ability to discipline students for off-campus activities. Despite efforts to address the issue, the fake accounts persisted.
Teachers reported the fake accounts to TikTok, but many were reluctant to provide personal IDs for verification. A TikTok spokesperson confirmed that several fake accounts were removed after being flagged by a reporter.
The incident has led teachers like Scibilia and Motz to advocate for better education on responsible tech use and stronger policies to protect educators. Experts warn that such abuse can severely impact teachers’ mental health and reputations.
Following the exposure, the students involved in the fake accounts deleted their “apology” video and removed the teacher’s handle from their account. They added a disclaimer stating they would no longer impersonate teachers.
The Great Valley incident highlights the growing challenge of managing students’ use of social media and protecting educators from online harassment.