Screen Schooled: Two Veteran Teachers Expose How Technology Overuse Is Making Our Kids Dumber

by Joe Clement

Staci was the first student to make this clear. One of the class’s alpha females, she had a strong, dominating personality and ruled over her clique with an iron fist. She felt resentment toward authority and strongly disliked being told what to do. She struggled in school and engaged in a daily fight with Dana over Staci’s perpetual use of her phone, hair brushing, and talking to her girlfriends throughout class. Dana has no counseling or psychological credentials, and she assumed Staci was just severely narcissistic. Shortly after the first semester, Dana was caught off guard when she received news that Staci wouldn’t be returning to her class. Staci had tried to kill herself. Dana learned she had been cutting herself with a razor blade in the restroom, and eventually tried to slit her wrists. Although the resulting wounds were mostly superficial, her underlying problems clearly ran much deeper. She spent the remainder of the school year in a mental health facility. Dana barely had time to process what had happened with Staci when a week later another one of her students was also hospitalized for attempted suicide. Riley was a quiet, reserved, and conscientious student. She stayed away from the drama that surrounded Staci and her friends. So it was surprising to learn she had taken a bottle of pills after an incident involving her boyfriend, who had recently broken up with her and posted ugly rumors about her on social media.