If you’ve been anywhere online these past few weeks, ice bucket challenges have been taking over your entire Instagram feed (paired with a video of said person getting a bucket of ice water dumped over their head).
The trend comes from the USC Speak Your Mind Challenge, a viral campaign started by the MIND club at the University of South Carolina to raise awareness and funds for Active Minds, a mental health nonprofit. People record themselves dumping ice water over their heads and then challenge friends to do the same within 24 hours, creating a viral chain reaction.
If this sounds familiar, it’s because it’s inspired by the original ALS Ice Bucket Challenge that swept the Internet during the summer of 2014. This was one of the earliest viral social media trends, as millions of people all over the world dumped buckets of ice water on their heads to raise awareness for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), a degenerative neurological disease that currently has no cure.
Many celebrities participated, even household names like Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga, helping boost the popularity of this trend and raise a staggering $115 million for ALS.
Now, more than a decade later, Skyline students are participating in the revamped challenge. “I did it because I wanted to support mental health and the resources needed to help people,” said Cece Sharkey-Miller (‘26). “I was nominated by Gabi Arocha.”
The re-instated challenge has also gained controversy; many people argue that it doesn’t actually raise awareness for mental health since the majority of participants only dump water over their heads because their friends are doing so, and don’t talk about the reason behind the challenge.
Skyline teacher Christopher Naar would “probably disagree, because even thinking back to when they were doing the ALS [challenge], this is something that a lot of people probably aren’t familiar with.”
Naar argues that many people have probably heard of mental health, but they don’t necessarily know how many people they know are impacted by it. “At least as far as raising awareness, when you see people getting buckets [dumped] on their head or people are asked to participate in the challenge and stuff, it goes viral,” Naar said.“I think that [the intention] is just trying to make people aware and say: look this exists, this is something that people deal with. I don’t think the intention is there to teach them. It’s like: this is happening, here’s what we’re doing, go research and go look into it and see how you might be impacted by it.
Others agree that the challenge raises awareness, but doesn’t really drive actual monetary donations to the cause. While most participants just pour ice water on themselves without mentioning donations, the challenge was originally meant to raise funds for Active Minds. So far, it has raised $400,000 toward a $500,000 goal. “I don’t think people are doing it for the right reasons. I think a lot of people are doing it for fun,” said Troy Banks (‘27). “Right now [the challenge is mostly done] to raise awareness because I don’t think actually everybody’s donating after they do the challenge. If it’s to actually raise money then I think it should be a different challenge.”
If you’re interested in donating to mental health, support the #SpeakYourMIND Ice Bucket Challenge for Active Minds at the fundraising page here.
