WHAT IS YOZGOO — A BULLYING PREVENTION PROGRAM FOR GRADES 2-6

One game. Real research. A measurable shift in how students handle bullying.

Yozgoo is a research-backed, web-based bullying prevention role-playing game — built by Clemson University and Gamify, and tested with real students before it ever reached a classroom.

Designed for students in Grades 2-6 - Covers physical, verbal, exclusion & cyberbullying

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Grades 2 through 6, running in a web browser, no download needed. That's Yozgoo in practice. Clemson University and the game studio Gamify built it because a poster on a hallway wall never once taught a kid what to actually say when someone's mocking them by the lockers. So instead, students play through it. They see the moment coming and have to decide what to do, the same choice they'd be facing for real at recess. Clemson ran the numbers on 120 kids who played against a control group who didn't, and the ones who played walked away knowing more about bullying than when they sat down.

THE YOZGOO STORY

Grounded in peer-reviewed research.

Clemson University and the game studio Gamify built Yozgoo together, one full-length role-playing game, running in a browser, no software required.

None of it is guesswork dressed up as curriculum. Every scenario traces back to peer-reviewed research on bullying prevention. A kid builds their own character first, then plays through situations built to teach them how to spot bullying, handle it when it's happening, and use a response that's actually been tested, not just one that sounds good on a poster.

The whole world is fictional, planet Yizzle and all, but the situations aren't. A kid getting left out of a group chat. A name that won't stop following someone down the hall. It's all kept kid-friendly start to finish, nothing graphic, nothing scary, just familiar.

1
Meet Yoz from the planet Yizzle, here to help your school.
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Learn real strategies to identify and manage bullying.
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Help other students navigate what's happening at their own school.
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Explore secret mazes and challenges along the way.
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Rack up points and chase the high score in class.

Yoz

1. If someone is calling you a hurtful name, that is verbal bullying. This kind of bullying also includes taunting, teasing, and threats.

Real in-game dialogue. Every lesson happens inside the story itself.

COMMON QUESTIONS FROM EDUCATORS

How Does Yozgoo Prevent Bullying?

These are the questions administrators, counselors, and teachers ask most often when researching bullying prevention programs for their school.

What Types Of Bullying Does Yozgoo Cover?

Four types: physical, verbal, exclusion, and cyberbullying. A kid doesn't get handed a vocabulary list for any of them. They run into the situation first, inside the story, and figure out what it is as it's happening, closer to how it actually goes down at school.

PhysicalVerbalExclusionCyberbullying

Is Yozgoo Appropriate For Elementary School Students?

Yes. Built for grades 2 through 6, upper elementary through early middle school. The reading level, the pacing, even how the characters talk, all of it's calibrated for that age. Nothing in the game gets graphic or scary. It stays a kid's world.

Does Yozgoo Address Cyberbullying Specifically?

It does. Cyberbullying gets the same weight as the other three, physical, verbal, and exclusion. A student runs into a group chat scenario or a screenshot getting passed around, the same as they'd hit a hallway shove or a nickname that stuck. None of the four gets treated like an afterthought.

How Does Yozgoo Actually Change Student Behavior?

Through repetition, mostly. A kid plays through the same kind of scenario more than once, and the right response gets easier to reach for each time. Clemson measured that directly and found a statistically significant increase in bullying-related knowledge among the kids who played, not just a feeling that it worked.

WHY SCHOOLS TRUST YOZGOO

Tested With Real Students Before It Reached A Single Classroom.

Clemson didn't just ask teachers if they liked it. Researchers ran a true experimental trial, 120 students split into two groups, one playing Yozgoo and one getting nothing at all. Only the group that played came out the other side knowing measurably more about bullying than when they started.

120students studied in a controlled trial

2-6grade levels supported

4bullying types addressed

Clemson University Gamify CURF

"Students actually asked to keep playing after class ended. That's not something a worksheet has ever done for us."

Elementary School Counselor [placeholder quote — pending collection]

"We needed something we could point to as evidence-based for our board. The Clemson research made that an easy conversation."

4th Grade Teacher [placeholder quote — pending collection]

"Setup took less time than most of our other classroom software. Kids were playing within a day."

Middle School Administrator [placeholder quote — pending collection]

Many schools fund Yozgoo through existing bullying-prevention and school-safety grants rather than out of a general classroom budget. See grant and funding guidance →

Why Game-Based Bullying Prevention Works Better Than Printouts?

Type "anti bullying games" into Google and most of what loads is a five-question quiz wearing a game's skin, or a PDF worksheet you print once and lose in a filing cabinet by October. Yozgoo isn't that. It's a full interactive game, and there's a university research study behind it, not just a claim on a landing page. Read more in our post: Traditional Anti-Bullying Programs Are Failing.

Feature	Yozgoo's Game-Based Approach	Typical Worksheet-Based Programs
Format	Ongoing, story-driven scenarios students want to return to	One-time printable activities, no follow-through
Execution	Self-guided gameplay that runs with minimal teacher setup	Relies on a teacher to explain and lead every lesson
Assessment	Backed by a peer-reviewed, controlled research study	No way to measure whether knowledge actually changed
Curriculum	A structured anti bullying program for schools, built specifically for grades 2-6	Free resource libraries with no structured curriculum

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The Types Of Bullying Every School Should Recognize.

Most bullying prevention programs pick a lane, usually physical or verbal, and call it done. Yozgoo's curriculum covers all four, because a kid dealing with exclusion at lunch is often the same kid getting messages about it that night.

Physical Bullying

The shove in the hallway. The trip that's somehow always "an accident." It's the kind of bullying a kid can actually point to and name, and somehow still the kind adults miss constantly, because most of it happens in the gaps, the bus line, the far end of the recess field, the ninety seconds between periods when nobody's technically watching anything.

Verbal Bullying

Name-calling. A nickname that started as a joke in September and never stopped by November. Teasing that's really just an insult wearing a laugh track. None of it leaves a mark, so unless a kid actually says something out loud, a teacher has almost no way of knowing it's happening at all.

Exclusion Bullying

This one's harder to catch, because there's nothing to catch. A kid gets left off the group project again, or nobody saves them a seat again, and there's no incident to write up since nothing technically happened. Most bullying prevention programs skip right past it for exactly that reason.

Cyberbullying

It doesn't clock out at 3pm. Phones, group chats, gaming platforms, whatever app the school hasn't caught up to yet, it follows a kid home and keeps going all night. Ask any teacher which type they feel least equipped to handle, and this is usually the answer.

BUILDING THE RIGHT PROGRAM

What A Strong School Bullying Prevention Curriculum Should Include?

Every vendor pitch says their program changes behavior. Before signing off on an anti-bullying program for your school, it's worth knowing what actually separates a curriculum that works from one that just gets a checkmark next to "bullying prevention" on this year's compliance report. Read more about the learning science behind Yozgoo in our blog.

1
Covers all four bullying types, physical, verbal, exclusion, and cyberbullying, instead of zeroing in on just one.
2
Uses real anti bullying games instead of only worksheets, because a kid remembers what they practiced longer than what they only read once.
3
Age-appropriate and grade-banded. Grades 2 through 6 shouldn't read or pace like a program built for high schoolers.
4
Backed by measurable research. An actual study showing knowledge or behavior improved beats an anecdote every time.
5
Fits real classroom time and budget, and it's worth checking whether it qualifies for school-safety grant funding before ruling it out.

FOR STUDENTS & CLASSROOMS

How Students Can Avoid And Respond To Bullying At School?

A kid can define bullying perfectly on a worksheet and still freeze up when it's actually happening to them at the lunch table. Part of Yozgoo's curriculum is closing that gap, giving students strategies they can reach for in the actual moment, not just definitions to memorize for a quiz. So, how to avoid bullying in school?

👀

Recognize the signs early. Yozgoo trains students to notice bullying as it starts, across all four types, so it doesn't take an escalation for someone to notice.

🗣️

Tell a trusted adult. Every scenario in the game treats reporting to a teacher, counselor, or parent as the obvious first move.

🤝

Practice being an upstander. Students play through moments where stepping in for a classmate, safely, actually changes what happens next.

🎮

Build confidence through repetition. It's a game kids replay on their own, so a strategy gets practiced five or six times instead of once in an assembly.

ANTI-BULLYING RESEARCH

The research behind Yozgoo's approach.

Reviewed by the Yozgoo Research Team In partnership with Clemson University Last updated August 2026

Anti bullying research is the difference between a program that actually moves the needle and one that just sounds good in a pitch meeting. Yozgoo's case rests on a controlled study out of Clemson, 120 students, an intervention group and a control group, no cherry-picked testimonials standing in for data. The kids who played came away with measurably better bullying-related knowledge than the ones who didn't play at all.

Kurt Olson founded Yozgoo. He's a sociology professor by training, and it shows, the whole program leans on research instead of instinct, built alongside Clemson University and the game studio Gamify.

Kurt Olson, Founder, Yozgoo

Sociology professor and researcher with a focus on bullying prevention, partnered with Clemson University to design and test the curriculum before it reached a single classroom.

Clemson University peer-reviewed study on Yozgoo controlled trial, 120 students, intervention vs. control design
About Yozgoo founder background and program partners (Clemson University, Gamify, CURF)
Grant & funding guidance for schools evaluating research-backed programs against available budget

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Yozgoo?

It's a role-playing game built for grades 2 through 6 by Clemson University and the game studio Gamify. Students play through story scenarios covering physical, verbal, exclusion, and cyberbullying, and in a Clemson study of 120 kids, the ones who played came away knowing significantly more about bullying than the ones who didn't.

What grade levels is Yozgoo designed for?

Grades 2 through 6. That covers upper elementary through early middle school, and the reading level, pacing, and scenarios are all built around that range.

Is Yozgoo based on real research?

Yes. Clemson ran a true experimental study, splitting 120 students into intervention and control groups, and the kids who played Yozgoo came out with significantly better bullying-related knowledge than the ones who sat it out.

How is Yozgoo different from other anti-bullying programs?

Most anti-bullying programs for schools are free worksheets, print once, hand out, done. Yozgoo is a full game with a peer-reviewed study behind it, and kids come back to it on their own instead of needing a teacher to walk them through it every single time.

Can schools use grant funding to pay for Yozgoo?

Often, yes. A lot of schools pay for Yozgoo out of existing bullying-prevention or school-safety grants instead of the general classroom budget, and Yozgoo has funding guidance to help find the right one.

How much does Yozgoo cost per student?

It's priced per student. A single license, a class of 35, a school of 210, or a custom quote for a district, whichever fits your situation.

Do students need to install anything to play Yozgoo?

Nothing to install. It runs in a browser, and there's a free demo if you want to see it before buying anything.

Is Yozgoo safe for student data privacy?

Student data privacy is a core requirement for how Yozgoo is built. In-game data is kept separate from general site data, and the specifics are spelled out in Yozgoo's privacy documentation for schools.

How do teachers or administrators get started with Yozgoo?

Play the free demo first. Then pick whatever tier matches your class or school. No sales call needed just to look at it.