EdTech: A Necessary Reassessment
By Nidhi Gupta, MD
A 13-year-old patient of mine used Google Classroom on a school-issued laptop to secretly chat with an adult stranger, share photos, and plan a meeting. Stories like this raise difficult questions: Are the very tools designed to educate our children instead exposing them to harm and shallow learning?
Educational technology (EdTech) includes two components: hardware (laptops, iPads, tablets) and software (apps, platforms, and digital systems). EdTech undeniably promises conveniences, personalization, and streamlined instruction. But education is not simply about speed or convenience. It is about cultivating deep thinking, sustained focus, and productive friction.
Concerns about EdTech fall into four primary domains: efficacy, safety, distraction, and health.
1. Efficacy: Does Screen-Based Learning Improve Understanding?
Students read at similar speeds on screens and paper, but comprehension and accuracy are much stronger with paper. A 2024 study from University of Columbia Teachers College found that digital reading led to shallower processing, while paper reading supported deeper comprehension and memory. Simply put, paper books help ideas stick better.
Researchers also note a growing “screen inferiority effect.” If exposure to digital technologies from an early age inherently strengthened digital reading skills, we would expect comprehension gap to shrink over time. Instead, evidence suggests the opposite: the comprehension gap has widened over the past two decades.
Note-taking research tells a similar story. In their landmark 2014 Princeton study, Mueller and Oppenheimer found that students who handwrote notes retained concepts better than those who typed. Laptop note-takers copied more words verbatim, but again, this shallower processing led to weaker understanding. Recently, neuroscientists in Norway discovered something fascinating: handwriting activates richer brain networks in ways typing does not. These networks are essential for memory formation. The fine motor control of pen on paper seems to prime the brain for learning in ways that keyboards do not.
2. Safety: Data Privacy and Platform Misuse
Safety concerns extend beyond content access. Many EdTech platforms collect significant amounts of student data. Invasive data mining practices are harmful to children. Such practices expose children to targeted advertising, location tracking, and long-term digital profiling.
In August 2025, the Federal Trade Commission issued an amicus brief clarifying that EdTech platforms must directly (and not through schools) obtain informed, and voluntary parental consent to comply with federal children’s privacy laws.
3. Distraction: Multitasking and Impaired Focus
Online learning and presence of technological devices in the learning environment encourages shorter attention spans and shallower information processing compared to paper-based learning. Laptop multitasking has been shown not only to lower the multitasker’s performance, but it also distracts nearby peers, lowering their scores as well.
4. Health Effects: Long Term Impact
EdTech integration requires children to use screens throughout the school day and often at home for assignments. This dramatically increases cumulative screen exposure.
Research points to a looming myopia epidemic, with half the world’s population projected to be near-sighted by 2050. Posture strain, sleep disruption from blue light exposure, and early studies suggesting possible hormonal changes and early puberty add further complexity. When school and home screen time are combined, the significant cumulative exposure may carry consequences for children’s health that we are only beginning to understand.
Recommendations:
It is critical to distinguish between digital literacy and digital dependency.
Digital literacy, the ability to type, code, conduct responsible online research, and navigate digital tools, is essential. These skills can be intentionally taught in dedicated technology classes. Digital dependency, however, occurs when screens become the default medium for every subject, every day.
The evidence is not a call to eliminate technology. When carefully designed and thoughtfully implemented, certain EdTech tools might make a positive impact, though evidence remains inconsistent.
When evaluating an EdTech program, schools should critically assess two domains:
(A) Efficacy:
- What research supports the program?
- Is the evidence independent or company-funded?
- How does it compare to non-digital alternatives?
- Does it demonstrably improve comprehension and retention?
(B) Safety:
- What student data is collected?
- How is it used, stored, and secured?
- Who has access to it, and for how long?
- Are third-party apps, links, or advertisements embedded?
- Is offline functionality available?
True 21st-century education requires discernment. By being intentional about when and how technology is used and by prioritizing offline tools where they are demonstrably superior, schools can cultivate students who are digitally literate but not digitally dependent.
This is not about rejecting the future. It is about shaping it wisely, together.