Will our generation be better off than our parents? What will this generation do for the world? As the school year closes, we pondered these questions.

Problems like terrorism in the post-9/11 world, school shootings, climate change and political divisions have raised people our age; many of these issues are problems that previous generations never had to deal with. While some of these events have created a surge of activism among today’s young people, the repeating trials also cause young adults to turn a blind eye to these events and get fatigued from everything. Ignoring the situations is detrimental to changing these causes, but there is hope with the newly found activism through social media platforms, while older generations mainly show their support for causes through monetary donations.

From the national school walkout to the Stand for the 2nd walkout, this generation has already used its voice to show what is important to them. Possibly because our generation is the most diverse of them all, according to the Pew Research Center, our generation has a wide variety of beliefs and passions, on topics such as climate change, education, mental health, equality and more. Unlike previous generations, kids these days have the world at their fingertips. The new way of sharing opinions makes it easier for a person to hide behind a screen instead of interacting, but it also sparks new ideas and the ability to organize just about anything with a tap on a screen.

The internet has also led to a greater awareness of the importance of mental health. This generation has accepted and confronted the mental health epidemic, which is very different than any other generation from the past. Increased awareness across the internet and social media has helped to end the stigma behind mental health and also influenced the surge of people seeking help for mental health problems.

While the internet has been around our entire lives, past generations have been introduced to it at varying points in their lives. As a result of that, some students’ parents lack trust in the security of technology, but others find it to be a nice convenience. However, most teens trust technology almost too much, whether it is speaking to a device called Alexa or sharing their locations at all times on Snapchat. The oversharing of information can negatively affect the security of people.

Moreover, our generation faces a huge amount of stress that is put on teens today. Not only have college admissions proved to be harder over the last couple of years, but the rigor of work has also greatly increased. The high-stress situations that this generation has experienced will make our generation more easy-going as parents, according to some of us.

What defines this generation? Will we continue to go down the path of activism and use technology to use our voice? Only the future can tell.