On Wednesday, February 26^th, Aspen High School attempted to create a No Technology Day in an effort to urge students to turn off their phones, iPods, computers etc. for an entire school day.

The unity group brought up the idea and then they incorporated the day into the middle of Unity Week.

“The goal was to get everyone to look up from their screens and leave their comfort zones.  We wanted everyone to meet new people without the security blanket of their phones.  We wanted our school to become less segregated and the first step to this was getting people to communicate with others face to face,” junior Kayla Soufer said.

Being a participant and observer of No Technology Day, my general take on it was while it was a clever idea; it was a struggle for students to actually follow through and participate in it.  Looking around in the commons at lunch I still saw people indulged to their screens playing Flappy Birds (myself included) or zoning out by listening to music.

In class, people were still using their computers to look at photos on Facebook, and using their phones to help class go by faster.

While I believe it was a great effort to get everyone off of technology for a day, I do not see the goal to be realistic.  Today, our entire society revolves around technology; therefore asking over 500 kids to eliminate social media for a day does not seem to be an easy task or even a possible one.

“I wish I could say that no technology day was successful for me personally but it was not.  Being on my phone is simply a habit for me and it would be difficult for me to break that habit all at once.  Unfortunately, on Wednesday I still used Google, listened to music, and texted my friends,” sophomore Jonathan Wells said.

All this being said No Technology Day sent a significant message.

“I thought No Technology Day was great.  Even though not everyone went along with it, I think it made people think to try and communicate more.  In fact, I think Unity Week as a whole made students in our school be more aware and accepting of different ethnicities,” sophomore Zoe Starensier said.