These guidelines apply everywhere in the app: questions, answers, comments, communities, direct chat, your profile, your display name and your avatar, and anything you attach. They form part of our Terms of Service.
What we expect
- Be useful. Explain how you got to the answer, not just the answer. The person asking has to be able to do the next one alone.
- Be kind. Everyone here is stuck on something. Nobody gets mocked for asking.
- Be honest. If you are not sure, say so. A guess labelled as a guess is genuinely helpful; a guess presented as fact can cost someone marks.
- Tag properly. Correct grade, correct subject. Mis-tagged questions reach the wrong students and get ignored.
- Credit your sources. If you copied a worked example from somewhere, say where it came from.
What is not allowed
1. Bullying and harassment
No insults, name-calling, mocking, humiliating or pile-ons. No following someone around the app to attack their posts. No threats of any kind. No unwanted, repeated messages after someone has asked you to stop. No sharing someone’s private information, photos or messages to embarrass them.
Calling an answer wrong is fine — that is how the community works. Calling the person stupid is not.
2. Hate speech and discrimination
No content that attacks, demeans or incites hatred or violence against a person or group based on race, ethnicity, nationality, tribe, language, gender, sex, sexual orientation, disability, religion, belief, culture, birth, or any other ground protected under section 9 of the Constitution. No slurs. No hate symbols. No jokes that are a slur with a punchline attached.
3. Sexual content
No nudity, no pornography, no sexually explicit or suggestive content, and no sexual advances towards anyone. This is a platform used by children as young as 13.
Zero tolerance. Any content that sexualises a minor, any attempt to solicit a minor, and any grooming behaviour results in an immediate permanent ban, preservation of the evidence, and a report to the South African Police Service where the law requires it. There is no warning and no second chance for this.
4. Personal contact details
Do not post phone numbers, WhatsApp numbers, email addresses, home or school addresses, social media handles, or links to private group chats — not yours, and definitely not anybody else’s.
This rule frustrates people who just want to swap notes, and we keep it anyway, because it is the single most effective thing we can do to stop adults with bad intentions moving students off the platform to somewhere nobody is watching. Use in-app chat instead.
5. Exam leaks and cheating on assessments in progress
Not allowed:
- posting or asking for leaked exam papers, memoranda or question papers that have not been publicly released;
- posting questions from a test, exam, controlled assessment or timed task while it is in progress;
- asking someone to complete an assignment, project or portfolio task that will be submitted as your own work;
- offering to do someone’s assessment for them, for points, for money or for anything else.
Allowed, and encouraged: past papers that have been officially released, homework, revision, practice questions, and asking how to approach a type of problem you will face in an assessment later.
The test is simple. Am I trying to understand this, or trying to avoid understanding it? The first is what RaisedHand is for. The second is cheating, and it is also how you fail the actual exam.
6. Spam and self-promotion
No repetitive posting, no irrelevant links, no referral or affiliate links, no advertising, no selling anything, no promoting paid tutoring services, no chain messages, no vote manipulation, no multiple accounts to farm reputation points, and no posting low-effort answers just to earn points.
7. Illegal and dangerous content
Nothing unlawful under South African law. No content promoting self-harm, suicide or eating disorders. No drugs, alcohol, weapons or gambling. No instructions for anything dangerous. No malware or phishing links. No content that infringes someone else’s copyright — do not upload an entire textbook.
8. Impersonation and misinformation
Do not pretend to be another student, a teacher, an examiner, a school, the Department of Basic Education, or RaisedHand staff. Do not deliberately post answers you know to be wrong.
How to report something
- Open the post, comment, message or profile.
- Tap the … menu.
- Tap Report and choose a reason.
- Add a short note if there is context we would otherwise miss.
Reports are confidential. The person you report is never told who reported them. Please report rather than replying in kind — arguing with a rule-breaker in the thread usually just gets both of you a warning.
If you cannot use the in-app report tool, email kagiso.thobane.73@gmail.com. For anything involving a minor’s safety or a credible threat, put URGENT in the subject line.
Blocking
You can block any user from their profile or from the … menu on their post. A blocked user cannot message you, cannot reply to your posts, and disappears from your feeds. They are not told. Unblock at Profile → Settings → Blocked users.
Blocking protects you. Reporting protects everybody. When something breaks these rules, please do both.
What happens when rules are broken
We look at what was posted, how serious it is, whether it was aimed at a specific person, and whether it has happened before. Depending on that, we may:
| Action | When we use it |
|---|---|
| Remove the content | The post breaks a rule. It comes down and you are told why. |
| Warning | A first, minor breach — for example an off-topic post, a mild insult, or a phone number shared without thinking. |
| Remove points or badges | Reputation that was earned through vote manipulation, multiple accounts or spam answers. |
| Temporary suspension | Repeated breaches after a warning, or a single more serious one. You keep your account but cannot post for a period. |
| Permanent ban | Serious or repeated harm: harassment campaigns, hate speech, sexual content, exam leaks, grooming, or evading a suspension with a new account. |
| Report to the authorities | Content involving the sexualisation of a minor, credible threats of violence, or anything else where the law requires us to act. |
If you think we got it wrong
We are a small team and we do make mistakes. If your content was removed or your account was actioned and you think that was wrong, email kagiso.thobane.73@gmail.com with your display name and what was removed. Tell us why you think the decision was wrong. A person will look at it again and reply.
Appeals are not available for content involving the sexualisation of a minor.
For parents and teachers
If you are worried about something a student has posted or been sent on RaisedHand, email kagiso.thobane.73@gmail.com. Include the display name involved and a screenshot if you have one. You do not need a RaisedHand account to report something to us.
More context on how the app handles student data is in our Privacy Policy, and the routes for deleting an account are on the Account & Data Deletion page.
Changes to these guidelines
We will update these guidelines as the community grows and new problems appear. The “Last updated” date at the top of this page always reflects the current version.
The short version: help people learn, be decent about it, keep your personal details to yourself, and don’t help anyone cheat on an assessment they are busy writing.