The world thrives off of wifi and social media. It’s not uncommon for people to ask cafes, stores, and even restaurants what their wifi password is to access the universe of Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. However, what happens you can’t access these applications through wifi?

A few weeks ago, Aspen High School “shaped” its wifi so that the school could no  longer access the more popular social media applications. While some people believe a fire wall has been put up, blocking them, this isn’t the case.

“So there’s not a wall put up,” Evan O’Branovic, technology integrator said, “We actually shaped traffic on certain websites in order to prevent our bandwidth from being crushed.”

This means that when there are a lot of people on the school’s network, and everyone is watching their Snapchat stories, it causes a slow down, or “traffic” on the school’s other networks. This affects the ability of even an administrator to log in or use the internet.

“It was affecting teachers’ ability to teach,” O’Branovic said.

While the only reason the school shaped the wifi was to have faster network, some students have believed the reason was to have them look less at their phones, and more at the people around them.

“I think it’s because in class, we’d go on the apps and teachers would complain,” Sophomore class president, Josh Etkin said.

Once the reason behind the shaping of the traffic was explained, Etkin had a different view on the situation.

“Well I can see that because if one hundred kids are on it, it’s bound to slow down. It makes complete sense,” Etkin said.   

Although the wifi is shaped, this doesn’t stop students from finding another way to use wifi for their social media apps.

“I downloaded an app that would help boost it, so I was still able to use them,” Etkin explained.  

Kids are basically using an application in order to use their other applications. The app students are using provides a VPN which essentially “distracts” the wifi so it will think you are on a site or app that the wifi doesn’t slow down.

As for the students who don’t have the app, they continue to use the applications with their cellular data, which adds to phone bills. However, this won’t stop students from scrolling through their social media feeds, watching Snapchat stories, or seeing videos on Facebook.

While the wifi is shaped currently, AHS is planning to improve their wifi plan by the end of February. Then, wifi for social media might be available once again.