In our quest to create the best school, we’re trying to understand better how teenagers think about school in general and how we can improve it for them.

 

In the following survey, we targeted gamers between 13 and 18 years of age and asked them a couple of questions. The participants were selected from different gaming communities such as Apex Legends, Fortnite, Leauge of Legends, Minecraft, VRChat, and others. In total, 31 people participated in this anonymous survey, but we only analyzed the data of 13 to 18 year-olds, which left us with 22 people.

Here are some highlights

Students think that school is boring and don’t like the commute. I think that’s really sad, but I’m not shocked: As a teacher, it’s hard to keep up with the excitement teens get in their free hours from technology and games. This is not necessarily the teacher’s fault, but a consequence of the rigid school system.

 

I think it’s interesting to see that most teenagers like gaming because it’s a way for them to hang out with their friends. There’s definitely a statement to made if games are going to be the future of social media. Titles like Fortnite seem to experiment in that direction, with recently holding a live concert in Fortnite.

 

At first glance somewhat contradictory, ca. 70% of participants prefer meeting their friends in-person. One interpretation of this could be that if given the chance, in-person meetings are preferred. However, meeting in-game is much easier (time, cost, etc.) and therefore is often done in addition to real life hangouts.

 

Of course, we also had to ask this question: “Would you prefer to go to a virtual school?”. Around 40% said yes. Interestingly, younger teenagers preferred a virtual school more than older ones.