Catholic Schools Ahead of the Curve When It Comes to Curbing Cellphones Matthew McDonald Always connected? The latest technology? Easy access to the web? Cellphones everywhere? St. Alphonsus Parish School in Seattle has none of that. And it doesn’t want it. “When I tell prospective parents we’re tech-minimal, people light up about that,” said Nick Padrnos, […]
5 Charged with Laundering Money for Sextortion Scheme That Led to Michigan Teen’s Suicide Channel 4 News, August 2, 2024 17-year-old Jordan DeMay died from suicide after being blackmailed online. DeMay, 17, was a student at Marquette High School when Nigerian men contacted him on Instagram, pretending to be a girl. They convinced DeMay to […]
Students Target Teachers in Group TikTok Attack, Shaking Their School The New York Times, July 6, 2024 Seventh and eighth graders in Malvern, Pa., impersonating their teachers posted disparaging, lewd, racist, and homophobic videos in the first known mass attack of its kind in the U.S. A spokesperson for the Great Valley School District confirmed […]
The Washington Times – Tuesday, July 16, 2024, by Sean Salai Worried parents have been keen to send their children to school with cellphones ever since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and mass shootings ushered in the new millennium. Now, public officials complain that students are using smartphones more for cyberbullying, video games and pornography […]
Liz was recently featured on the Safety Is Sexy podcast discussing how to help young people get safe and savvy online. “Thanks for the opportunity to express our thoughts on ‘Sexy Online Safety” 😊 (Don’t worry – the podcast is rated G!)”, says Liz. Listen and learn all about a myriad of topics from what […]
Worried About Your Tween’s Screen Time? Check Your Own, New Study Says. The Washington Post, June 17, 2024 For families who want to keep their tween children from spending too much time in front of screens, a new study offers illuminating advice: Parents, you’ll need to put your phones down first. The study, published this […]
How A Connecticut Middle School Won The Battle Against Cellphones The Washington Post, May 1, 2024 What unfolded at Illing Middle School in Manchester, Connecticut reflects a broader struggle underway in education as some administrators turn to increasingly drastic measures to limit the reach of a technology that is both ubiquitous and endlessly distracting. Scores of schools […]
A New Book Has Amplified Fierce Debate Around Teens, Mental Health And Smartphones NBC News, April 3, 2024 “We have overprotected children in the real world and under protected them in the virtual world. “Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt’s “The Anxious Generation,” argues that the smartphone-driven “great rewiring of childhood” is causing an “epidemic of mental […]
What Students Are Saying About the C.D.C. Report on Teen Sadness New York Times, March 2, 2024 Teenagers reported record levels of sadness in the most recent Youth Risk Behavior Survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. According to the recently released survey, which was given to 17,000 adolescents at high schools […]
The goal of monitoring kids’ technology use is to both ensure their safety AND build their skills toward self-protection and self-regulation when they are online. To this end, the goal is not to ‘catch’ them doing something wrong. Rather, we want them to learn what poor online behavior is while encouraging and discussing what positive […]