Old-School Nokia 3310 Instead of Smartphones: A Reality in Elite Schools

One of the most elite schools in the UK — Eton College — has banned traditional smartphones in favor of the old-school Nokia 3310 phones. Here’s why.

Preface

Eton College is considered to be one of the best private schools in the United Kingdom for secondary school-aged boys. It’s also a school that has banned the usage of traditional smartphones like iPhones and Samsungs on its grounds and replaced all phones with old-school sturdy Nokia’s instead. Yes, you’ve heard that right — the students of Eton College are issued the Nokia 3310 phone for use on school grounds. Eton College says plans to issue Nokia 3310 phones to its students arose among concerns about the mental health of the younger generation.

Eton College Replaces Smartphones with the Nokia 3310 Phone

According to multiple sources, the new intake of 13-year-olds in Eton College will be prohibited from using phones on school grounds at all times. According to one of the teachers at Eton College, the SIM cards of the smartphones of children will be transferred to Nokia phones issued by the school. In fact, it’s not exactly clear what Nokia phones will the attendees of Eton College receive — but as we can tell from multiple sources, the phone is likely to be the Nokia 3310.

Eton College says that such measures were implemented because of concerns centered around the mental health of young people attending the school. The new phones will have no Internet access but will allow pupils to text and/or call their close ones by using the SMS or call functionality within the Nokia 3310.

As far as older-aged pupils go, Eton College says that it’s issuing “age-appropriate controls” to them too.

With a price tag of around £18,000 per term, Eton College isn’t a college to joke around in — the school has educated some of the brightest minds across the UK including Boris Johnson, David Cameron, and others, and with this step, the next generation of people leaving Eton College will probably be in a way better space mentally than their counterparts attending other schools. Banning smartphones on school grounds may be an excellent step in improving their mental health and studies can corroborate that too — according to the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University, overly relying on technology such as smartphones and computers can lead to increased anxiety and stress, so banning smartphones altogether may be a step in the right direction.

Other Ways to Protect Your Mental Health

Aside from replacing smartphones with the robust Nokia 3310, there are other ways to protect the mental health of students, employees, and everyone around the school grounds. One of those ways includes making use of data breach search engines like BreachDirectory — the BreachDirectory data breach search engine will provide you with information on whether your account is found in any data breach existing in its database thus allowing you to promptly change your password or perform other measures to protect yourself from identity theft and sleep soundly at night.

For those working on cybersecurity, the BreachDirectory API will help you protect your clients and everyone around you, too — the BreachDirectory API will let you derive data from the data breach search engine in a JSON-based format and implement the data into your application or system for your use case.

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Summary

The decision to ban smartphones in favor of the Nokia 3310 or other standard and sturdy phones by Eton College may be regarded as a rather unusual step, but we think that this step by the college is likely to improve the mental of their students. What do you think? Do you support the decision of Eton College to replace smartphones with the Nokia 3310 phone? Why or why not? What means do you employ to protect your mental health both offline and online? Tell us in the comments below, and until next time.