The school district where Aubreigh Wyatt — who died by suicide at 13 years old in September 2023 — attended has “numerous anti-bullying measures and curriculum,” a spokesman for the district tells PEOPLE.
Aubreigh’s name and story have spread far and wide on social media after her mother, Heather Wyatt, began posting TikToks about Aubreigh and shared her grieving process. But recently, Heather was ordered by a court to shut down her social media accounts after a lawsuit was filed against her by the parents of four teenagers claiming Heather had implicitly accused their children of bullying Aubreigh before her death, The Washington Post reported.
The court-ordered shutdown brought Aubreigh’s name into the spotlight again as social media users and other popular TikTokers began posting messages of support for Heather.
Although Heather never named the four teenagers involved in the suit publicly, some of their names and information were shared widely on the internet along with purported texts between Heather and Aubreigh detailing the alleged bullying that took place while Aubreigh attended Ocean Springs Middle School.
In the parents lawsuit, they claimed defamation and slander, stating that their children were sent “revolting” messages, Newsweek reports. The outlet further reported that the parents said in their suit that an investigation by local authorities found Heather’s bullying claims to be unsubstantiated.
On July 16, the parents dropped the lawsuit, according to a filing shared by Vicksburg News and reviewed by PEOPLE. Two days later, on Thursday, July 18, the Sun Herald reported that the judge overseeing the case also lifted the social media ban against Heather.
Trey Brennan, spokesman for the Ocean Springs School District, tells PEOPLE that initiatives to create “healthy relationship building” begin as early as elementary school.
“Our middle and high school students (7th-12th grade) also participate in National Bullying Prevention Month, and have school counselors assigned to each grade level to meet with students and provide them with appropriate resources,” Brennan says.
Later, Brennan added: “OSSD has also partnered with several local and state organizations to provide additional mental health resources and anti-bullying initiatives. Through our partnerships with these organizations, we are able to provide our students with access to mental health therapists, televisits with counselors, and additional materials for bullying prevention and education. All of our schools have a Positive Behavior Specialist in-house, which is a licensed professional counselor or licensed clinical social worker, to work with all of our students.”
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As for “future initiatives,” Brennan also added that, “OSSD recognizes there are always ways to improve our procedures and methods for each student to be provided with a safe and successful learning environment. We are collaborating with other local school districts to launch a Hope Squad program for our students in grades 7-12. The program uses evidence-based methods for creating a sense of community and belonging for students, and trains them to serve as leaders for their peers to help improve school and community culture. We are hoping to launch this program sometime in the fall.”
The district has also “worked to reassign duties internally and added support positions to allow for more face-to-face interaction between our students and counselors,” Brennan says. “These changes will help provide our students and counselors with additional time and resources to develop relationships for both academic success and social wellbeing.”
If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by dialing 988, text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis Text Line at 741741 or go to 988lifeline.org.
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