Last month, Australia became the first country in the world to ban social media for children under 16.

No TikTok.

No Snapchat.

No Instagram.

No some other platform I probably don’t even know about.

Major social media outlets are now required to block access or face real consequences.

The government called it a health emergency. They said the research was clear: near-constant social media use is detrimental to young people’s mental health, exposes them to bullying, and distorts the reality of how they see themselves and others around them.

And short of debating the ins and outs of this new law, it seems as if Australia trying to solve an issue that’s clearly front of mind for all of us.

As a place deeply invested in kids’ development summer after summer, we’re all for it.

The Problem Nobody Can Fix Alone

A few months back, we wrote about the collective action problem with phones and social media.

Kids don’t actually want to be on social media because it’s sooooo amazing.

They want to be on it because everyone else is. If all the other kids are there, being the only one off feels like being in a social desert.

Fixing this on the individual family level is a struggle. Telling your kid they can’t have Instagram while all their friends do is a hard battle to fight.

Parents are caught between a mental health rock and a social hard place. Worry about what your kids are exposed to. But also worry about them potentially being left out.

Australia’s solution is to eliminate the choice for everyone at once. It’s is a big (and important) effort to solve the collective action problem.

The cool thing is, this is the same thing we get to do each summer at camp.

The Camp Way

At camp, everyone goes screen-free. Campers. Staff. Everyone.

It’s not legislated. There are no fines or age verification software. It’s just how camp works, and everyone knows it before they arrive.

It’s a shared norm that everyone accepts from the start.

Remember when we wrote about friendship being the number one thing parents mentioned in our surveys? Over 70% of families said friends were what their kids loved most about camp.

Those friendships happen because kids are fully present with each other.

No phones means no divided attention. No checking notifications during activities. No comparing themselves to carefully curated online versions of other people’s lives. Just real connection.

The structure we talked about in that newsletter (cabin groups, age groups, sides, whole camp) works so well because everyone’s actually engaged. And one major reason is because there’s no digital escape hatch to jump through.

What This Actually Looks Like

I say this from summer after summer of watching how things shake out at camp. When kids don’t have phones at camp, they don’t just sit around missing them.

They play. They talk. They invite each other to activities. They make up the best kind of inside jokes that only make sense if you were there.

They’re hanging out on the porch, playing cards, starting four-square or pickleball tournaments, or just talking about everything and nothing in particular.

Parents often tell us they notice the difference when their kids come home. They’re more present. More willing to have actual conversations. More patient.

Sure, kids go back to their phones after camp. We’re not living in some dream world where summer camp solves this permanently.

But for a few weeks, they get to practice what real, undivided connection feels like. They remember that friendships can exist without a screen between them.

The Simple Truth

Australia recognized something we’ve known for a long time:

Kids are healthier and happier when they’re not constantly plugged in.

They’re trying to solve this on a national scale. We don’t have that kind of authority, but we’re trying to solve the same problem every summer on 80 acres in the Texas Hill Country.

Here, being in the moment is the norm. Kids get the break they actually need, even if they didn’t know they needed it.

Erec Sir