High school is a crazy concept. It constantly changes, teachers, students, and the overall environment are never the same. But how exactly has it changed? From family life to technology, the past 25 years have been a crazy ride.

One thing that’s been drastically developed, which is already pretty obvious, is technology. Many parents look back and compare their schooling experience to ours and think how much easier we have it now. Instead of walking to the library to do a simple research paper, we can now have all the information we need at our fingertips. But of course, with every blessing comes a curse. Technology brought social media such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Adults weren’t as consumed with constant self-esteem issues that social media has created. Now, high school students, boys and girls, can barely think straight. Over 70% of girls age 15 to 17 avoid normal daily activities, such as attending school, just because they feel bad about their looks, and 75%  of teenage girls with low self-esteem have been reported engaging in negative activities like bullying in school, smoking, drinking, or disordered eating.

But that’s not the only issue unfolding in modern high school. Many students’ family life has gone awry due to family issues. Since 1990, divorce rates have increased by 25%, and now almost half of marriages fail. While most divorces are civil and don’t often end in terrible family feuds, there are some instances where the issue follows students to school. In a recent study done by Business Insider, a high school teacher who goes by the name Hope Rigby- Wills states how “I’ve seen a significant drop off in the number of parents who are able to assist with homework and can participate in conferences and PTO meetings… due to divorce”.  Many family issues like this impact a students educational value. Children of divorced parents are twice as likely to drop out of high school than their peers who are still living with parents who did not divorce.

Teen pregnancies, on the other hand, are at an all-time low. In 2012, an average of 29.4 live births occurred per  1,000 in 15-19-year-old women. In contrast, there were an estimated 1 million pregnancies and 521,626 births to U.S. women aged 15-19 years in 1990, which is a huge difference.  This is probably due to the acceptance of different forms of birth control and nonprofit organizations, like Planned Parenthood, that assist in teen pregnancies, which wasn’t very popular until the mid 90’s.

With our new acceptance of new ideas different communities we as a generation have the power to make the next 25 years even more progressive.