A guide to navigating the countless ‘toga’ and ‘shs’ Instagram accounts

Graphic by Grace Lin

The countless “toga” accounts students can follow on Instagram.

Instagram is the hub of out-of-pocket “toga” accounts: @togabadparking, @toga_goofy_shoes and the notorious @togaconfessions_. In addition to pre-existing accounts that keep students updated on school news and events, such as @shsasb and @toga.2026, there are dozens of non-school affiliated accounts for students to follow. 

Due to the surplus of accounts, it may be hard to decide which to actually pay attention to. However, some “toga” accounts are more important and reliable than others. Let’s run them through.

1. Your class’s account

Following your class’s account should be your go-to option. While following the ASB, spirit, tech, dance and rally leadership accounts are also important, your class’s account covers important class-specific fundraisers, spirit weeks, rallies, dances and other major upcoming events. 

For instance, @toga.2026 — the Instagram account for class of 2026 — advertised several December spirit events, including winter formal, spirit week and night rally: all topics students expect to find on multiple other leadership accounts, but can actually all be found on one account.  Not to mention, class accounts typically repost posts from other leadership accounts through Instagram Stories. 

Your class’s account has all the necessary information needed to stay updated for any occasion.

When thinking about a solution to reduce the excessive amount of leadership Instagram accounts, I took a closer look at the content each of the accounts actually post. 

The class-specific accounts are important, considering they have specific posts such as class meetings or homecoming practice dates. On the contrary, the other leadership accounts — spirit, tech, dance and rally — all post similar content that can be combined.

For this school year’s winter formal, both @shsdance.co and @toga_tech posted about the winter formal — @shsdance.co informed its followers about specific details such as the price of tickets and date of the event, while @toga_tech posted a video to promote the event. This felt redundant; the separate posts could have been posted on one account — @shsasb — to appear more straight-forward to students. The same goes for the other two leadership commission accounts.

2. “Not affiliated with SHS” accounts 

While these accounts are fun, most of them don’t last for more than a couple months. Recently, however, many of these accounts have resurfaced and started posting again.

Students should be familiar with these accounts already: @togaistired, @toga_goofy_shoes and @togabadparking. Many of these accounts have the infamous captions “Not affiliated with shs,” meaning they aren’t officially associated with the school like ASB accounts. 

These fun accounts rank higher than the school club and sport accounts, since they apply to a wider audience. They can entertain students browsing on their Instagram feed with posts like the hilarious parking fails from @togabadparking or the wacky shark slippers from @toga_goofy_shoes. 

Personally, I follow most “not affiliated with shs” accounts that come my way, due to their entertaining nature.

In the end, these accounts are not sustainable: most of them become inactive after a couple months. 

To determine which accounts will last for a longer time, I suggest checking the number of followers it has. An account with over 400 will  last longer than ones with only 100 to 200. 

Another method to determine how long an account will remain is by referring to the account’s topic. Accounts like @toga_goofy_shoes will only last so long. How many goofy shoes can they scout out until there are none left to post?

On the other hand, an account like @togaconfessions_ can consistently post for a considerably long time — at least 4 months. @togaconfessions_ posts students’ opinions about random subjects using anonymous Google forms. Due to this, it can exist for much longer.

Even though they may not last for over 2 months, it is worth the time to follow these amusing accounts while they last!

3. Sports accounts 

Follow if you want to support your fellow athletes, but it really isn’t necessary if you don’t plan on attending any games.

Many sports have an Instagram account dedicated to posting game day reminders and senior spotlights. Following the accounts may not be necessary, but showing your support for fellow students never hurts. 

During a particular sport’s season, you can also try to follow a sport’s Instagram account to stay updated on when their game days and senior night take place. If you don’t want to follow more accounts, an alternative could be taking a quick glance at these sports’ accounts without actually following, since most are public.

Another method to combat this problem is the school creating a new Instagram account that notifies students about all the sports’ games going on each week; this can help narrow down the wide range of account selections students must pick from, rather than following @saratogasportsboosters, @toga6thman, and the individual teams.

4. Club accounts 

Most club accounts have roughly 200 followers. However, most clubs don’t have that many members attending their meetings. The only valid reason to follow a club’s Instagram account is if you’re actually a member or if you’re interested in joining, so you can keep yourself updated on meetings and fundraisers.

If your excuse for following a club is that you want to know when their fundraisers will be held, keep in mind that students actually a part of the club generally repost this information to spread the word.

When most students already follow hundreds of accounts on Instagram, it’s hard to decide which of them are actually necessary. In addition, many changes can be made to these accounts to make sure students don’t get confused.

While it’s easy to follow all of them that come your way, filling your feed with countless posts just gives you an excuse to continue scrolling through your phone. Try to see whether an account’s posts just clog up your Instagram feed. Do you find the posts from the account negative or annoying?  Or are the posts informative and entertaining?

The general rule of thumb is to follow accounts which are actually most relevant and important to you — like the clubs you’re a part of or the class you’re in — and then to go from there.