Silenced Screens: Dozens of Apps and Sites Have Been Blocked This Year
October 5, 2016
As they continue to settle back into their school routines, most students have now discovered the frightening truth: Netflix and Spotify are no longer loading, and Twitter feeds and Tumblr blogs have stopped refreshing. These changes have left disgruntled students with no other option than to learn and pay attention in class — which is the exact intended effect.
These and many other new apps have been blocked on the student network effective with the beginning of this school year. Restrictions mainly target any sites or apps that the school has deemed distracting, including Spotify, Pandora, and Netflix, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, Yik Yak, Whisper, Omegle, and Kik Messenger.
In addition to wanting to encourage student attentiveness in class, a secondary factor is the amount of network traffic that has been taking place due to streaming.
Mr. Heinick, La Salle’s Director of Technology, confirmed that the new blocked apps are the result of decisions made by him, Mr. Kuffner, Mr. Devine, and Ms. Powell, and emphasized that this move was made to address two main concerns: student distractions, and costs of an overburdened network.
According to the Mr. Heinick, parents, teachers, and students “felt it would be helpful to have fewer distractions in class” and have asked for help in limiting these interruptions, resulting in the new network blocks. This has come after several years of exploring the advantages and the drawbacks of using iPads. Using recommendations from the website commonsensemedia.org, apps that have been deemed “distracting” include the social media giants Twitter and Instagram.
This being said, many of the apps that can be distractions for students also carry educational value. Even though apps such as Instagram and Twitter are notorious go-to’s for students who want to hone their procrastination skills, these apps have also proved to be beneficial in some classes around the school. Teachers have regained access to blocked apps by contacting and explaining to Mr. Heinick why they need a specific app in their classroom. Mr. Heinick then edits the network setting for a specific class to tailor to the teacher’s needs. This process is the result of the school’s decision to start off with a fairly restrictive list of blocked sites and then “pull back the blanket as needed”
When asked about her opinion on the new network restrictions placed on streaming apps, Ms. Coleman said that she has mixed feelings, but that she is mostly in favor of the decision. She believes that many students do not realize the amount of data that they use, when listening to apps like Pandora and Spotify and urges that “[students] use iTunes, so they don’t have to stream.” This being said, Ms. Coleman admits to adding to the network strain last spring with her support of the March Madness brackets of both the students and faculty, and said that it “got to the point of ridiculousness,” but says that she has not heard any negative feedback from her students regarding greater restrictions.
In contrast to Ms. Coleman’s views, some students feel that some blocked apps, such as those that allow music streaming, are beneficial to their learning. Junior Joseph Dierckes said that “music helps me focus” and get work done in class, and he disagrees strongly with the school’s decision to block apps like Spotify.
The school’s secondary reason for implementing the blocks are the costs related to network usage. La Salle pays for each gigabyte of data used by students. According to Mr. Heinick, “We pay for what we use” and streaming is the “big spender” making up the biggest chunk of used data. “On our network,” he said, “60 percent of network traffic is streaming.” As a result, the move to block unnecessary streaming apps like Spotify and Pandora will cut costs for the school.
Though many streaming apps have been blocked, entertainment and education apps like YouTube will remain unblocked because of their wide usage and educational value in the classroom.
However, some students have attempted to circumvent the new restrictions through a variety of methods, including the use of a VPN, or virtual private network. A VPN allows a person to bypass a public network’s restrictions, including blocked apps and sites.
“The hope is we can see this for what it is, an attempt to remove distractions, and there’s going to be ways around it but hopefully students won’t try go too far out of their way to bring distractions back into their lives,” said Mr. Heinick, when asked about students’ VPN usage.
However, Mr. Heinick commented that “It’s one of those thing [where] we try to do our best to remove distractions, [but] there’s no way that we are able to limit everything.” Overall, Mr. Heinick says that he will continue to work on restricting unwanted apps and VPNs as needed as the year progresses, but he knows that he cannot stop all unwanted app usage.
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What do you think about all the new app restrictions this year? Let us know in the comments below.
Emily Crouch • Oct 6, 2016 at 8:35 am
Blocking apps like Twitter and Netflix is a good idea. Blocking apps like Spotify and Pandora is not. I, along with most students I know, use music to focus when working in class. I personally think working is a lot less stressful when your favorite songs are playing in the background. La Salle Admin is usually very competent at making decisions, but on this one I think they overdid it.
Sam Hull • Oct 5, 2016 at 9:17 pm
I agree with the descion to block a lot of games on the ipad but why block apps like spotify?
Brigid Hanley • Oct 5, 2016 at 8:50 pm
I can understand the blocking of apps like Netflix, which can always be considered a major distraction during school hours. I agree, however, with what others have said about Spotify and Pandora. I generally work better, and am less distracted, when I have music playing to tune out what’s going on in the classroom around me during quiet work time. I’ve found that unable to play music, I accomplish less in the time I am given, being drawn into conversations or movements around me. I was confused when I heard that the decision had been made to block these apps because teachers often play music in class as well, especially during those vital work times. Everything, including Spotify and Pandora, can understandably be misused. In general though, it seems that the majority of students only open these apps when the timing is appropriate.
Eleanor Springer • Oct 5, 2016 at 7:14 pm
I agree with this decision because it is important for us as students to have full focus on our education. Even though some may disagree with this decision, I think it is right for us to have our attention on our teachers and what we are learning instead of getting lost in social media and other apps. I think this is it good for our iPads, but I think this is not right if we are trying to stream something or go on social media with our phones. It takes away our data, and then things just collapse, and you have no data left for your phone. Though the restrictions are great, I would consider having a network that doesn’t block media and other apps for cell phone users.
Zoe Wilber • Oct 5, 2016 at 6:49 pm
As upsetting as it may be for me to continually swipe down a Tumblr feed page that simply won’t refresh, I do admit that I have been inclined to participate more in my classes since the social media apps have been blocked, and I think that many students could reasonably agree with me. My largest complaint, however, lies with the blocking of Spotify and Pandora. I don’t buy iTunes music–why would I if Spotify music is readily available to me? For most students, to use either of these free music apps on their iPad is to simply use the available wifi network, not data, in order to listen to music. Music helps some students focus, while it helps others relax. I for one enjoy listening to instrumental and electronica music while doing in-class work or homework, but I have unsuccessfully been able to do this so far this year because music is a “distraction.” Now if a student is avoiding eye contact, bobbing his/her head, and blasting music through her/her headphones, I think it’s safe to assume that the student is being distracted in class by music. But this rarely happens. Students want to listen to music during “down time” throughout the school day (i.e. not during a class lesson). Is that too much to ask? It’s a shame that the administration hasn’t recognized how little of a distraction music is to us students because, in reality, it’s a learning and destressing tool.
Delaney Miller • Oct 5, 2016 at 7:53 pm
I agree with Zoe on this one. It is actually much easier for me to focus and get my work done while I am listening to music. There is a time and a place to have headphones in and I understand that it can be frustrating for teachers to constantly be asking students to take them out, but blocking these apps altogether seems like an unnecessary step. I don’t think that it will do any good in the long run to prohibit students from listening to music. In fact, it will just incline more people to be using their phones during class. Social media may be a good idea to block, but Spotify and Pandora should be allowed to stay.
Simone Stoney • Oct 5, 2016 at 11:06 pm
I disagree with opening up the ban on music apps that use streaming. I would really like to listen to my music too, but the school pays for that usage. What the article fails to explain is that wifi is still a data collector and cost money. It just does not have the extra fees your CELLULAR data adds on top of it. Data is virtual space and it takes room and for any storage area, you must pay for it. If the school is having 60% of the data traffic being used as a streaming service, then it is paying for the data the wifi is collecting. That is a lot of money the school could be saving to put back into tuition and other school funds. As much as I want to listen to music too, I would much rather have more affordable tuition than to pay more to compensate for our data usage.
Gabi Stoney • Oct 5, 2016 at 11:17 pm
Zoe, I really want my music back too but this article stated that La Salle spends money on every gigabyte used and wifi still collects data. La Salle probably uses more than ten gigs of data everyday and 50 gigs per week multiplied by 40 weeks of school equates to 2,000 gigs of data saved. Depending on how much money each gig costs, that can be pretty spendy. If that cost can save La Salle money and allow them to give that money back to us then I am okay with that. It takes about 50,000 emails being sent and recieved without attachments to create a gigabyte worth of data or 33 hours of streamed music. I know for a fact La Salle is sending and receiving more than 50,000 emails throughout one day with attachments and since virtually everyone is streaming music, is will equate to more than 33 hours in one day. That money can add up really quick when you actually put numbers and money to this situation. If we do not save any money over this next year then of course this will just be a failed experiment and they should just give the students back at least their money, but I believe that there will be money saved by blocking music apps such as Spotify and Pandora.