10
STUDY HALL
senior musings and goings-on
by Bianca Ianneillo
SOCIAL MEDIA IS NOT THE FULL STORY
Throughout the months of March, April, and May, social media was a toxic place to visit for teenagers. Not that it normally isn’t, but this time, it was even worse than usual.
Why? Three words: College. Admissions. Videos.
For example:
COLLEGE DECISIONS 2021
Harvard: Accepted
Yale: Waitlisted
University of Michigan: Accepted (honors college)
University of Some Random School I’ve Never Heard Of: Waitlisted
East Jabip University: Accepted (full scholarship)
Every other video on TikTok was someone listing all of the schools they applied to and which ones they got either accepted to, rejected from, or waitlisted at. Every acceptance letter warranted an Instagram or Snapchat story. Quora, the strange forum I used just that one time but now get emails from twice a day, kept prodding me: “What schools accepted or rejected you?” Seeing these questions right in my inbox made questioning my life choices just super convenient.
Can you imagine if we did that with anything else in life? Made videos going through decision-making processes of everyday life?
But imagine we really did it, in a way in which we actually told the whole story?