Junior Cai Flowers never expected her first TikTok video to gain over 587 thousand views.

“I made a funny video on my Snapchat, and one of my friends told me I should make it into a TikTok,” Flowers said. “I took his suggestion, but I wasn’t expecting to go viral at all.”

TikTok allows its users to select songs or snippets of dialogue to lip-synch and dance to. 

Flowers, a die-hard fan of the Broadway musical “Hamilton,” created a comical TikTok with music from the show. The text on her video, a new feature introduced by the app, reads “my music vs. my friend’s music.” Her music choice was from “Hamilton” while “her friend’s” choice was “Shotta Flow” by NLE Chopper.

“I’ve made other TikToks, but they are not nearly as popular as [the Hamilton one],” Flowers said. 

Junior Maya Estrera has been making TikToks since she downloaded the app over the summer.

“Initially [TikTok] started as a joke,” Estrera said. “My friend Charlotte Means and I downloaded it together as a joint account. I was too embarrassed to have my own account.”

Estrera, whose videos showcase trending dance challenges or a series of tricks, films many of her TikTok’s on campus, especially on the Great Lawn. She believes that a lot of students at St. John’s exploit the school for its opulent look, and while it may be okay to make TikTok’s on campus, they should not be made in classrooms unless given a teacher’s consent. 

Likewise, Flowers feels that the environment at school is changing because of TikTok. Many students think the app might be preventing students from getting homework done or focusing in class. 

“A lot of TikTok’s go viral because of the fact that they are made at school or in a classroom,” she said. “I feel that students at SJS have the urge to make a viral video, so they will intentionally film in classrooms.”

On the other hand, senior Will Sampson, who created a TikTok that gained 564.3 thousand views, believes that the app does not have a serious impact on the environment at school. Sampson finds that TikTok is different from other social media platforms because creators don’t interact with users directly. 

“It’s definitely a very popular app, but I think it might be short-lived,” he said.

Two years ago, the widely popular lip-synching music video app was purchased by a Chinese company called Bytedance. Recently, the Committee on Foreign Investment is afraid of the potential security and privacy threats TikTok poses. Nevertheless, kids continue to use the app to become “TikTok famous” and promote their accounts.  

Although the Committee on Foreign Investment is afraid of the potential security and privacy threats TikTok poses, kids continue to use the app to become “TikTok famous” and promote their accounts.

Junior Nina Varma feels safe online when using such entertainment platform because the app addresses real issues in a way that the student body’s generation responds to. Varma appreciates her ability to discuss what’s happening in the world through TikToks. 

“I’m not a big person involved in social media because I’m a big believer in protecting my privacy,” she said. “[But] with TikTok, I feel safe and I feel a sense of community.”