A summer read is helping adults in the community empathize with students’ relationship with technology.
By Lillian Wright-Attea ’27
Photo by Julia Schure ’26
Over the summer, teachers got some reading homework alongside their students.
The Parents Association invited teachers across all divisions to read and discuss Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation. The book has become a #1 New York Times bestseller in part because of its comprehensive analysis of how phones are contributing to the youth mental health crisis. Since the pandemic, teen rates of depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues have skyrocketed. Research has largely attributed this rise to an increase in social media and phone use and a decrease in in-person interactions.
Hallie Grodin, a co-leader of the Parents Association, says the book was selected in order to raise teachers’ awareness about the issue. “The more we are all in this together, the easier it will be for our children and all of us to be on the same page,” she says. Associate Head of School Page Fahrig-Pendse, who works closely with the Parents Association, explains, “In the world, there’s been a lot of focus on smartphones and what’s good for children … Now we’re starting to be like, ‘Oh, wait a second, there have to be limits on this.’”
The book has been a source of affirmation for many teachers and parents who have been seeing the use of phones, and the problems they cause, increase over time. “My initial thoughts [were] a little bit of dread in terms of getting work over the summer,” jokes Heather Chu Marvill, a Middle School art teacher and GFS parent. “But a lot of what I read from the book felt like a lot of the things that I'm currently dealing with, having a sixth grader and eighth grader.” As a teacher, she’s observed phones becoming more and more prevalent, as well as a “pressure to perform” regarding social media.
As a newcomer to the Upper School, Ana Paulis ’27 says that the phone policies are “fine,” but feels that other divisions’ policies cast phones, especially social media, “in a bad light.” “[The Middle School] was like, ‘You can’t be on social media at all because it’s going to rot your brain and you’re going to feel horrible…’ High school doesn’t do that as much because I think they understand that we’re just going to use social media anyway.”
Other faculty members, like new English teacher Callie Ward, see the book as a step toward educating teachers about the teen mental health crisis, but believe more needs to be done. “I went into it without really knowing what to expect,” she says. “I think I was hoping it would give me better information about what we might be able to do for this generation of students who seem to be struggling with a variety of mental health concerns.” Although discussions surrounding cell phone policy and students’ mental health have increased over the past couple of years, the Upper School was the only division this year that did not experience policy changes.
This year, a new Upper School Student Life Committee was formed in an effort to include students in the conversation surrounding phone use on campus. The committee, which was announced on the GFS website in September, will “guide discussions on technology use and pilot initiatives to limit screen time on campus.” “We currently have a pretty good phone policy," says Matthew Young, director of Upper School. “It might be that [the committee] makes some recommendations for revisions [at some point].”
Meanwhile, the Lower School has drastically reduced the use of screens in classrooms, and the Middle School now requires phones to be locked in magnetized pouches for the duration of the school day. Although the possibility of the Upper School following suit was discussed, Young says this is no longer a consideration. “I understand that our students and our families are using these devices to help manage a vast array of parts of their lives, whether it’s transportation or academics. So, [a] unilateral removal of cell phones immediately from the lives of our high school students and our teachers, I don't think would have been a good approach,” he says.
Although the Student Life Committee is still very new, member Marc Lewin ’26, says they hope to address more than just cell phone policy. Supporting athletic teams and athletic participation are also important to the committee’s members. Avni Gupta ’27, another member, says the committee is all about having discussions to move the school forward. “It’s a bunch of students with different perspectives and a bunch of teachers with different perspectives [coming together] to get a [more comprehensive idea of] what the school could work on.” Gupta says their primary objective, though, is “making school a fun, better place that kids like.”
As GFS decides what place it wants phones to have in the community, The Anxious Generation has acted as a starting point for discussions surrounding phone use this school year. Continuation of these discussions resulted in a cell phone-free day (which occurred on December 5) and will likely result in more change as the year progresses.
Thank you for reading this Earthquake article! We hope you enjoyed. Please check out our other articles. Check us out on Instagram as well!