Few in the audience were unmoved at the end of Assertions, a song, dance and theatre performance about bullying.

The Thursday night performance took place at the Performing Arts Center at the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School, and was a collaborative effort among Island schools — both the regional high school and the charter school — IMP Improv for kids, YMCA dancers, Joanne Cassidy and other musical guests.

The dramatic elements of the show were orchestrated by Donna Swift, the founder and director of IMP. In order to accurately represent the problems surrounding bullying and the different opinions students hold, Ms. Swift went into the Island schools and asked kids to write about how they felt.

The results were incredibly varied, and it was these words, directly from Island students, that shaped the narrative of the performance. Hearing such a range of feelings about bullying helped the audience to understand why both the problem and its solution are so complex.

And if statements such as, “Bullying is the absolute worst thing that can happen,” seemed dramatic, they were outweighed by the callousness of words like, “How people think of you is their perspective, and they don’t have to like you.” Other moments showed remarkable sensitivity to both the bullies and the bullied: “Bullying is just an act. No one can be a bully, they can just act like a bully, because the person inside is just insecure.”

The students who participated in the performance made sure that the sentiments offered about bullying were genuine. Liam Waite, a member of IMP, said Ms. Swift had checked in along to way to make sure this was the case: “She asked us how it felt, if it felt authentic, and it definitely did.”

The students also liked that the mixed media complemented the spoken word element, painting a more complete picture of the emotional and psychological effects of bullying. Amy Fligor, a member of IMP who also danced with two other students and a dance group, was thrilled to be able to dance in the performance. “I thought it was really cool how they collaborated the singing and dance with the unscripted stuff, because you get the unspoken perspective,” she said.

Attaching words to an often-silent problem resonated with many of the performers. Della Burke, a junior who has been acting with IMP since third grade, said, “I wanted to be involved in this because it seemed like a cool project, but I also wanted to help portray the voices that can’t be heard.”

As with any contemporary discussion of bullying, the performance included a segment on cyber- and text-message bullying. Projected on the screen behind the students were messages that chronicled a barrage of online insults, all directed at one individual following the propagation of an utterly false rumor. The ability to see the messages as well as the effect on their victim made clear both the dangers of cyber bullying, and why it’s such an easy way to antagonize: The anonymity and the lack of face-to-face contact empower those who hide behind their computer screens.

The most powerful moment came at the end of the performance, when one of the students performed the song Mad World by Tears for Fears, while a slide show telling the stories of bullied teenagers who had taken their own lives played alongside. Even though the problem had been made concrete throughout the performance, the individual tragedies drove the severity of the issue home.

And while hardships were the focus of the performance, the students made clear that there are solutions: That teachers should listen to students about how to solve bullying, rather than endlessly dwelling on the problems; that you have to find out who you are and who are your true friends in order to stand up to the destruction bullies can level.

And while it may not be all that easy to stand up for yourself, the message of the performance was that there is reason to hope if everyone recognizes the problems — and begins to stand up for each other.