School psychologist testifies on device addiction and need for creative teaching

I'm a school psychologist, and I'm here as a collective voice.

You're my assemblyman.

I have two minutes to say that New York City public schools, once considered the showcase of education across America, it's become a data collection center rather than an educational institution.

And the DOE is exacerbating the students'visual addiction to devices.

And I have two minutes to say that the ever-changing curricula do not tap into the developing brain of children, especially those in the early grades.

And especially with very young children, giving them devices really disrupts the natural development.

So, also, I don't have to talk about the money part because we all know where the money is going.

But I should also not have to point out why Google should not be replacing actual teaching.

You know, things are kind of worse than what we discussed, and I'm kind of going off of my testimony after listening to everything.

The situation is a lot grander, you know, because we're talking about little pieces of it.

But we should not be discussing how to use technology in the schools.

We should be discussing creative teaching methods.

And the people actually in the schools,

where nobody is happy.

Teachers are also having symptoms from being on devices for too long with their eyes or getting headaches.

The teachers are not being allowed to teach creatively and actually teaching based on what their students'needs are because they have to do everything according to what is on Google.

You know, I run, for the sake of equity, I run an after-school fencing program for my students.

15 seconds.

Okay, and pulling them away from the devices when I go to collect them is like, it's mind-boggling.

And we feel there should be no technology at all.

Except AT.

Thank you for your testimony.