At Air Academy High School, many students are constantly using Social Media for their own personal reasons, but how does it affect them in school and how they think?

Some high school students rely on social media to stay in contact with long distance friends or keep up with the friends they don’t really talk to, but social media can also be a distraction and affect how people use their phones effectively for class work.

“I use social media a fair amount, at least a few times a day because it’s something to do,” said junior Mary Sullivan.

Texting and accessing social media are common ways of communication and entertainment, yet in high schools, they are progressing as a distraction against education.

“I use social media for talking to people and looking at memes,” said sophomore Gage Cook. 

In high school, social media is a constant in both inside and outside of the classroom, but are some people truly addicted? 

Both Sullivan and Cook agreed that others may be addicted to social media and rely on it too much for their well being. Social media is always there and available to distract some from their work.

“Social Media is a distraction for me, [and] it distracts me because it gives me something to do other than school work,” said Sullivan.

According to Pew Research Center in 2018, 88% of teenagers use social media on a weekly basis. This shows that the majority of teenagers own a social media account of some kind. Each social media app all has different amounts of usage by teenagers because each app is different in the way they’re used.  

According to Pew Research Center, in 2012, the amount of social media usage has been continuously growing because of people joining a Social Media platform and becoming addicted to it, and spreading it to their friends, causing more people to join the app.

Social media is constantly increasing with some students debuting on their accounts way prior to high school.

“I’ve had social media since elementary school, but it was originally for fun,” said Cook.

Students are constantly staring at their phones waiting for that next notification, just so they can once more give in to the power of social media.

“I do not necessarily feel that students overuse social media. Instead, I feel that students just need to learn to use it more responsibly. This includes knowing when and where it is appropriate, but also what is appropriate information to put on social media,” said Literature and Composition teacher Dean O’Banion.

Teachers notice that some students get distracted and use their phones constantly during their classes. Sometimes warnings and punishments just won’t do the job, as some students are truly addicted to the little world inside of their phones.

“Social media addiction is a real thing. Teens sometimes have a hard time not being distracted by social media; however, I feel that while there is a high use of technology, that does not necessarily mean that there is the component of addiction. The distinction is having harmful effects, especially if the thing that the person is addicted to is removed,” said O’Banion.

For students at Air Academy, social media can be a distraction and even go as far as being addictive, but to the mind it is simply a form of entertainment or a way to communicate with friends, and this can be controlled. It is all dependent on the mindset of the students; they have the power to prioritize class and put a pause on social media in classrooms.