Students at South Windsor High School were outraged when they discovered that they can no longer access Snapchat or Tiktok using the school wifi.
Tiktok and Snapchat are social media apps that have grown almost universally popular among teenagers. Students can interact with others online, and post pictures and videos on their stories and feeds. Many adolescents regularly utilize these platforms during school to interact with their friends, due to the difference in class schedules. They use their platforms to update their stories or post on their profiles.
These social media apps have been active with teenagers since they launched. Snapchat was founded in 2011, with 406 million daily users worldwide. As of 2023, 60% of teenagers use Snapchat. Snapchat has 500 million daily users worldwide.
With the popularity of Snapchat and Tiktok among students, many educators have implemented a no-phone policy during classes. Still, students have the ability to use their phones during free periods such as lunch and homeroom to access social media.
Now, those students are unable to due to that due to social media being inaccessible.
“It felt like it happened out of nowhere, and it really wasn’t necessary. Taking social media away from the students isn’t going to affect their learning, and teachers barely let us use our phones anyways, so I really don’t see where the school was going with this,” freshman Harnoor Khasria told The Prowl.
Students never had to deal with situations similar to this during their middle school careers, causing confusion in response to the school’s decision. Students find themselves at a disadvantage in this situation, as many of them use Snapchat or Instagram to contact family members.
“This is so bad; I can’t even text my sister anymore. Now it’s so lonely since I am only able to text her through Snapchat,” freshman Pranathi Matcha explained.
This is one of many issues that have been presented. While some students can use mobile data, others cannot afford it and have to rely on school wifi to use their phones.
As this issue continues, frustration among the student body increases. While word about the situation has rapidly spread with students, staff and teachers seem unaware of the issue.
“I have never heard of this issue before; I didn’t know this was happening,” Media Center technician Mrs. Poinelli said.
Currently, the school has not commented publicly on this issue.
