Rebecca Rogers

Rebecca Rogers (@rrogersworld) is a former high school social studies teacher turned TikTok phenomenon, with over 3 million followers and 116.4 million likes on TikTok alone.

Early Career 

Weeks into the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Rebecca found that most her students were struggling. With no in-person meetings allowed, her students became increasingly isolated and, as Rogers explained in one of her YouTube videos, “depressed.” Wanting to help them, Rogers tried to engage her students by discussing various topics of interest such as sports or anime but found the thing they were most interested in was TikTok, a platform known for short form, engaging videos. She downloaded the app and was surprised to find that a number of other teachers from her district had relatively popular accounts, one of whom was one of her colleagues from a different department at her school. Rogers asked her about the social media platform, the two became fast friends and began making content together.

Rise to Fame and Expansion to YouTube

In the early days of her content creation, Rogers participated in trends such as TikTok dances, but she soon began to make comedic skits about her experiences as a teacher. After a student said something funny in class one day, the students encouraged Rogers to make a video about it. She titled the video “Real Things Said in my Classroom,” and the video garnered a huge audience. Before long, other teachers and students from across the globe were reaching out with their stories, and so the series became “Real Things Said in Classrooms.” It was so popular, and Rogers was receiving so many suggestions for videos that she went on to create to more series called “I Don’t Get Paid Enough,” and “Story Time.”

As Rogers’ follower count continued to grow, she decided to branch out and begin making videos on YouTube, which allowed for longer and more in-depth content than TikTok. She created compilations of her TikTok series’, made Q&A videos, and long form ‘story times.’ She also created a new series called “Am I the Bad Apple,” in which her audience write in, explain a scenario and ask Rogers whether or not they did the right thing. Through the series, she touches on a range of social issues, often through humor. Most prominently featured in her content, though, is raising awareness about the issues faced by teachers.

Raising Awareness about Education

In an article for Medium, Rogers expressed her desire to raise awareness of the everyday issues and struggles faced by teachers across the globe. “I really want to help teachers.” She said, adding, “As a teacher of 4 years, I know the struggle. Education is such a mess right now and teaching is so unsustainable. I want to raise awareness of the struggle that is education. I want teachers to be appreciated, I want them to feel seen. They both need and deserve it. I also want to make a safe place for the students who maybe don’t feel comfortable in their own classroom setting.” In particular, she wants to ensure they are paid sufficiently for the hard work they do.

Through her authentic and relatable content across multiple social media platforms, Rebecca Rogers has built a brand and utilized it to highlight issues that educators from all over the world face. Using her personal experiences, humor, and positivity, Rogers has become a multifaceted digital influencer who inspires teachers, students, and others alike.