Twitter competition raises school spirit, awareness

Junior+Erin+Westermann+tweets+for+Canyon+High+in+the+Great+American+Rivalries+Contest.

Allison Koontz

Junior Erin Westermann tweets for Canyon High in the Great American Rivalries Contest.

Students can tweet using the hashtags #X and #GoEagles now until Sunday for a chance to win an in-school concert from the band Rixton for the “It Can Wait” campaign.

The Great American Rivalry Series teamed up with AT&T to award one of 42 schools with a free concert. The school with the most tweets, retweets and quote retweets on Twitter at the end of the voting period will be visited by Rixton, a four member band from Manchester, England  who are known for their song “Me and My Broken Heart.” Canyon and Tascosa high schools are competing for the most tweets, but the winner will not automatically receive the concert. As of Tuesday morning, Canyon has 16,611 tweets total. The current winning school has 335,771 tweets.

The AT&T “It Can Wait” campaign asks teenagers to tweet #X in order to inform their friends that they are driving and cannot respond. The campaign gives teens tips, safety apps and a texting while driving simulator to promote safe driving.

“This is for a good cause because there are wrecks that happen because of texting and driving,” junior Justin Johnson said. “The Great American Rivalry Series emailed Student Council so that’s where we ended up getting the idea from, and it really became a hit. I like to win, and I’m a competitive person so I do think our school will win.”