To our digital thriving community,​
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There’s no shortage of headlines about teens and tech. At the Center for Digital Thriving, we continue to hold space for a more curious and critically optimistic view of what a thriving digital future could look like.

But to shape the conversation, we must first understand it. That’s why we’re launching a new, five-week series to capture the latest stories: Three for Thriving.

How it works

1. Each week our team reads dozens of news articles at the intersection of youth well-being and technology.
2. At the end of the week, we’ll send a newsletter with some of the most interesting headlines we read.
3. And, we’ll record a Three for Thriving video recap to spotlight three stories that spark our own critical optimism and curiosity.

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With that, below is the first of this five-part, weekly series.

Three for Thriving - Week of April 21, 2025

This week’s news puts a spotlight on two ongoing threads around teens and screens:

1. What can social media companies do to better protect young people online?​
   A new Pew Research study finds teens are growing more concerned about social media’s impact on youth mental health—especially among girls. Some social media companies are taking note. Meta and Pinterest each announced new features aimed at putting more guardrails around teen use. Yet, in the same week, parents who lost children to online harms gathered outside Meta’s NYC office, calling for stronger accountability. As platforms introduce new safeguards, families continue calling for broader accountability—a sign of how complex and deeply felt these issues remain.
2. How will AI reshape education?​
   ​A draft executive order proposes integrating AI into K-12 schools through new federal initiatives, teacher training, and public-private partnerships. The proposal has drawn mixed reactions from educators and experts. While policymakers push for more AI literacy in schools, young people are already reckoning with its impact on education: new research shows Gen Z and millennials worry AI may be rendering degrees obsolete.

Watch this week's Three for Thriving video spotlight or read on for more of this week’s stories.

BBC News | Ben Price | Teens test virtual technology aimed at helping anxiety​
Welsh schools are trialing a new AR app that uses virtual flowers to help students express emotions and reduce anxiety. Early results show increased social connection and mental health benefits, particularly for neurodivergent students.

Business Insider | Peter Kafka | Roblox CEO says he wants to protect your kids — but you're going to need to pitch in, too.
​Roblox CEO David Baszucki recently stressed the importance of shared responsibility between the platform and parents in keeping kids safe online, noting that while Roblox invests heavily in safety tools, parental involvement remains essential.

EdSurge | Nadia Tamez-Robledo | Gen Z Is Growing Up in Education Upheaval. How Are Teens Doing?​
​How is Gen Z doing amid education upheaval? This news article highlights how Gen Z, the most diverse and digitally native generation, is navigating a turbulent educational landscape marked by pandemic setbacks, rising childhood poverty, and widespread mental health struggles, particularly among LGBTQ+ youth.

Fortune | Preston Fore | Nearly half of Gen Z and millennials say college was a waste of money—AI has already made degrees obsolete​
​Nearly half of Gen Z and millennials believe college isn’t worth the cost, as rising student debt and the rise of AI shift employer focus from degrees to practical, evolving skills.

The Independent | Jessica Coates | Social media curfews for children could become law, Labour minister says​
The UK may implement a legal 10pm social media curfew for children under 16 in response to growing concerns about tech addiction, mental health, and online safety threats.

K-12 Dive | Anna Merod | Teacher AI training remains uneven despite uptick​​
​Findings from a recent Rand Corp. study reveal that, while teacher training in AI has increased across U.S. school districts, major disparities remain between low- and high-poverty areas.

Mother Jones | Julia Lurie | HHS Plans to Cut the National Suicide Hotline’s Program for LGBTQ Youth​
​The HHS plans to eliminate LGBTQ-specific support from the 988 crisis line, drawing strong backlash from advocates who warn it could endanger at-risk youth.

Mashable | Christianna Silva | Pinterest wants teens to log off during school hoursPinterest is launching a feature to nudge teens to log off during school hours, aiming to curb in-class distractions and promote healthier tech habits.

Mashable | Rebecca Ruiz | Instagram will use AI to identify teens using adult account​​
​Instagram is ramping up efforts to protect underage users by using AI to identify teens misrepresenting their age and redirecting them into safer "teen account" settings. At the same time, Mark Zuckerberg is making headway in lobbying Congress to shift the responsibility for children's online safety from social media platforms to app stores.

Mashable | Rebecca Ruiz | Report: 1 in 7 teens exchange explicit images online for money or goods​​
​A startling new survey from Thorn finds 1 in 7 teens have traded explicit images for money or favors, underscoring the urgent need for open family dialogue around online safety.

Pew Research Center | Michelle Faverio, Monica Anderson, and Eugenie Park | Teens, Social Media and Mental Health​
A new Pew study finds teens are increasingly concerned about social media’s impact on youth mental health—especially among girls—yet many still value it for connection and creativity. Despite rising concerns among youth, parents still remain more worried than teens themselves.

The 74 | Cindi Carter | Protecting Children Online Takes Technology, Human Oversight and Accountability​
In a recent op-ed for The 74, Cindi Carter emphasizes the need for a combined approach of AI, human oversight, and stricter accountability to protect children from online exploitation, calling for stronger regulations and better age verification across platforms like Roblox and TikTok.

TechCrunch | Rebecca Bellan | Parents who lost children to online harms protest outside of Meta’s NYC office​​
​Grieving parents, who have lost children to online harms like cyberbullying and drug trafficking, held a vigil outside Meta’s NYC office, demanding stronger safety measures and accountability from platforms like Facebook and Snapchat.

Vox | Anna North | Should kids get mental health days?​​
​There's an increasing push to normalize school-approved mental health days for students as a response to widespread youth anxiety, depression, and systemic pressure.

The Washington Post | Frances Vinall | Draft executive order outlines plan to integrate AI into K-12 schools​​
​A draft executive order proposes integrating AI education into K-12 schools through federal initiatives, partnerships, and teacher training. The order aims to build national AI literacy and workforce readiness.

WBUR | Meghna Chakrabarti, Dorey Scheimer, Tim Skoog | ‘We're in jail with our emotions’
​WBUR aired the final episode of their series Falling Behind: The Miseducation of America’s Boys, which explores the mental health crisis among teen boys, emphasizing their growing loneliness, emotional suppression, and rising suicidal ideation. The last episode highlights the need for systemic, culturally aware change in schools and society to help boys reclaim their emotional lives.

A few words on our approach...

We track dozens of stories each week across youth mental health, AI in education, tech policy, and more. Then, we curate this newsletter to share the emerging trends, tensions, and ideas shaping the digital lives of young people. Inclusion of a story doesn’t mean we agree with it—it means we think it’s worth understanding. This newsletter is all about capturing what we see across the landscape and surfacing the patterns that are shaping the conversation. While we use AI to help with organization and drafting, this newsletter is very much human made. And sometimes, humans make mistakes. If you catch one, let us know!

The Center for Digital Thriving is a research and innovation center based at Project Zero at Harvard Graduate School of Education. Our mission is to create knowledge and research-based resources that help people – especially youth – thrive in a tech-filled world.

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