For years, laptops have been synonymous with NA students’ high school experiences. However, starting in the 2024-2025 school year, NASH officials will implement a “screen-free week” during one week per quarter of the school year.

The upcoming policy was first proposed by a group of NASH parents who developed into an interest group, Parents For Paper (PFP). PFP founder Bridget Southers explained the mission of the group.

“While we understand the benefits of providing students with laptops and phones, we as parents cannot help but notice the absurd amount of time our children are spending on these devices,” Southers told The Uproar. “Thus, we would like to see a return to a more traditional format of instruction. Pencils and papers are perfectly acceptable substitutes, so therefore, we, as parents, stand by paper.”

Gradually, the PFP has grown more popular in the community, and in response, NASH agreed to implement the “screen-free week,” which will ban student use of all electronic devices–including school laptops, personal computers, cell phones, tablets, wireless headphones, wrist watches, calculators, and even treadmills for all Health & PE courses–in all classes for one week per each of the four nine-week grading periods.

The general consensus among the PFP was that of excitement and agreement with the policy, as many members cited the many studies conducted on neurological correlations between laptop usage and deteriorating attention spans.

PFP member Jacob O’Brian expressed his excitement for the new policy.

“I am very excited to see this opportunity for the students to be away from their screens,” O’Brian stated. “It is invaluable that students can work in the most focused environment, and the removal of electronic devices will be a welcome contributor to creating such an environment.”

Additionally, Southers hopes that the new policy can be expanded to a more permanent solution.

“We hope to see success in this new policy as the first step towards the total removal of laptops, and by extension, all electronic devices in the future,” Southers expressed. “Students must be prepared for the real world, and to do so, we have no choice but to separate them from their laptops.”

However, Southers holds one objection to the policy.

“There seems to be a lack of steps for the proper enforcement of the screen ban outlined within the policy,” Southers said. “Teachers should be held to stricter standards for the monitoring of their students during the screen bans. The school should also have all the software necessary to ensure that no laptop is operating during screen-free weeks.”

While the policy has been popular among the PFP, many students feel very differently. NASH junior Wilson Schmidt expresses his frustration.

“Coming from NAI, I was already really upset about the annoying stairwells and the loss of windows [at NASH], and now they want to take away our laptops? I’m just sick of it all,” Schmidt stated.

Some NASH students have even started to take action against the policy. Senior Manny Golding recently organized a group to protest against the controversial decision.

“As someone who has relied heavily on a laptop for just about every one of my assignments over the past four years, I felt compelled to do something against this outrageous decision,” Golding said. “Students For Screens (SFS) was created to represent and protect all rising NASH juniors and seniors against this ridiculous policy. Our laptops are not going anywhere. We are not going anywhere.”

Despite the backlash amongst students, the “screen-free week” is set to be implemented in the 2024-2025 school year at NASH. If the results are favorable, the policy is planned to be extended to NAI the following year. 

“We are extremely happy to see North Allegheny making the right decisions for our kids, and personally, I am pleased with all the work the PFP has put in to make such a change possible,” Southers said. “As we have always said, ‘Paper is Progress, Screens are Restricting.’ I only hope the students learn this lesson soon as well.”

Editors’ Note: As the dateline suggests, this article is an April Fools’ prank and has no basis whatsoever in actual fact. It is entirely fictitious.