SJ Adams, 50, from North Dakota

I work in education and I’ve seen both sides of the fence. The good side of technology allows kids to learn in a different setting and those with disabilities a way to learn. It is too often that you see the results of the dark side of technology. The obsession with screens has lead to a meaner generation who have no remorse for their actions, shorter attention spans, lack of social interaction, and the belief they can get away with it online. The flip side is seeing teachers using their phones and texting in the classroom. I’ve seen this generation go after adults by posting and mocking them on social media. Perhaps, they see their parents doing it online and they see it as acceptable. It’s sad when you go to a coffee shop to visit or people watch and see the obsession with a small screen reflecting back to you even with they are with another person. I think education about technology needs to start at home with the parents. Kids need to be taught to interact with one another by playing and learning new things. Internet fails from time to time and you need to learn things that don’t include electronics.

Jessica Harris, 30, from Washington DC

I’m a millennial, actually, but I work with Gen Z-ers. I taught high school for five years and now train leaders in how to help Gen Z-ers. It’s a different world, even from mine. Cell phones weren’t a big thing when I was a teen/young adult (and they certainly weren’t smart phones!) but I still got wrapped up in the online world — spending hours watching porn and cybering (chat room sex- so 90s). I started an online relationship via chat room with a guy and eventually sent him my pictures. One of the biggest regrets of my life. Now, I work with Gen Z-ers, with specific emphasis on girls who are wrapped up in online relationships or sexting. What I find the most stunning is how they feel it’s real. They feel the relationships they have online are real. They are drawn to them more than relationships in real life — even friendships! Take away their tech and it’s like you’ve locked them in a room with no human interaction. My brother, who is four years younger, is really into gaming. He wasn’t interacting with the family so my mom threatened to kick him out. He said, “That’s fine! Whatever! My friends online will help me. I’ll just go live with them!” He let his online friends know that his mom was kicking him out and asked if he could crash at one of their places and they all said no. That’s when it dawned on him: “These people aren’t really friends.” For all we know they weren’t really real.

Susan Harvey, 62, from Huntington, NY

Technology is an essential part of life today and will become even more seamless and ubiquitous in the future. Even very young children inherently understand this as the way it is. We often speak with pride on their innate knowledge of how to use technology and make it work for them. But we don’t counter this with life’s wisdom of how every keystroke counts and is stored somewhere and may be irretrievable. They need to grasp the fundamentals of personal privacy and the damage that can be done to them now and in the future by what they “publish” often just by being in the wrong place at the wrong time with identifying technology. There is no such thing in today’s world as “confidential”. These truths are not self-evident nor are they easy for anyone to understand. This does not make technology evil, but always ahead of our ability to control it.

Sierra Morgan, 51, from Lansing, Mi.

With Gen Z, I have seen too many kids and young adults (13-18) put in situations that they were not prepared for because of too much access to technology. Coupled with their parents lack of adulthood training, their lives meld into what mass marketers tell them it should be. Dating in middle school and a camera phone before 18, not in my house. Social media has single handedly done more to destroy the better part of two generations now than just about anything I have seen in my life. The notion that we must post every tiny detail of our lives to be cool is being driven by mass marketers getting as much free data so they can better sell us stuff. Gen Z does not seem to have clear lines between the virtual and real world and for them, actions seem to never have consequences. Helicopter parents are always there to save them from themselves. The parents rely far too much on schools to parent and protect their children. If this would have been my daughter, she would have been forced to go to school and face the consequences from day one. I also would have had a stern discussion with the young man’s parents. If nothing came of it, then the police would have been called to deal with the young man and his parents. The school has no responsibility to adjudicate this nor to fix it. If this were my son, he would be dealing directly with law enforcement for sharing the young woman’s picture. He was raised knowing actions had consequences and as a black man, those consequences were going to be worse for him than they were for his white friends. My son is a Gen X/Millennial but I am in graduate school and am surrounded by Millennial/Gen Zers. They are a whole different species of human beings.