Students were left with low morale and “dry” phones on Monday, October 28th, when they arrived to school early that morning. Severn faculty members made it clear that they are over their classes and lesson plans being interrupted as they put pressure on Severn to block many sites from the Severn School wifi. Students rely on apps like Netflix, Snapchat, Instagram, and many others to get them through their days spent in school, however, they can no longer relax with these sites and many more.
Previously in the semester, staff writer Madi Meyer touched on many of the teachers’ thoughts and feelings about how the wifi affected their anticipated lesson plans. Madi investigated the situation from teachers’ points of view before the recent blocking of popular sites; I hope to shed some light on how the students are feeling, just two days after losing many of their privileges on campus.
During free periods, if one has finished all of their assigned work, they are now unable to fill their free time with internet access. The signal to the school, due to the materials that went into the buildings of Severn School, is not able to penetrate the walls of many classrooms and community spaces. Because of this, people were forced to go on wifi to access the internet, and not use their own data.
Senior Haley Davis offered her own thoughts on the matter at hand:
“It gets really hard without having the access to these apps when you’re at school for 8 hours working hard, you don’t have any way to wind down or relax in the way that we are all used to. As a senior, my work-load is harder than it has ever been, so when I have free time at school, sometimes it’s necessary for me to relax and get my mind off of school work. This block has made it impossible to do so.”
Seniors are not the only ones affected by this new limiting of freedom. Junior Cole Petrinko shared his own experience with the new circumstances:
“I couldn’t even send a text to my mom when she was concerned about me during the school day. She was not happy at all.”
This block not only affects students’ daily lives, but also puts a strain on the loved ones at home.
Wifi has been a regular topic up for debate between students and teachers for as long as I have been here. Countless class discussions have been interlaced with comments and complaints regarding the Severn School wifi. Visitors lose hope in the campus when they cannot send messages or check their notifications. The wifi troubles in the past have done a degree of damage to Severn School’s image, in the eyes of community members and others. Hopefully, after hearing from the students, someone will take charge and find a real solution to the wifi troubles.
