Project Reboot<\/a>, an organization born on Berkeley\u2019s campus, with the mission of helping young people \u201creset their tech habits, reclaim their time and regain their focus.\u201d<\/p>\nThe project began in the form of a semester-long class that helped students reduce their screen time.<\/p>\n
![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/UCBNoPhones1.jpg\")
A handmade sign reads \u201cLive With Intention\u201d at a phone-free event at UC Berkeley on Friday, April 24.\u00a0Credit: Eliza Peppel\/KQED<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like [screen] addiction has kind of been our birthright,\u201d said Dawson Kelly, a third-year student and one of the event\u2019s hosts. Kelly said he\u2019s working on a thesis about digital dependence. \u201cWe need more infrastructure for our generation to take back our time, take back our agency, and look at all the things that have been stolen from us, and not let this be the anxious generation that we\u2019ve been made out to be.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sahar Yousef, a Berkeley neuroscientist and lecturer who serves on Project Reboot\u2019s research advisory board, said her students are increasingly pushing back \u201cagainst the default of being on their phones, constantly scrolling.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is truly a demonstration that they\u2019ve wanted to put together,\u201d Yousef said, \u201cto demonstrate what has really been taken from them.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to a survey of UC Berkeley undergraduates, 78% of students reported that they believe their phone use \u201cprevents them from thinking deeply, being creative, or engaging fully with ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n
Third-year students Ashlyn Torres and Izzy Newman said they found out about the Friday event from a flier, instead of through the usual social media channels. Torres said she left her phone at home before joining.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was different this morning because I was able to recognize there is life around me,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd we probably should talk to each other more and just listen to what the world has to offer rather than just what our phones have to offer.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jonny Vasquez is a third-year student and advocate for reduced screen time on campus. To reach other students, he said, he started standing in a busy area of campus holding a sign that read, \u201cLowest screentime contest.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople would either completely ignore the sign,\u201d Vasquez said, \u201cor they would come up and say, \u2018Oh my goodness, I\u2019ve been waiting for someone to help us with this.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Vasquez said that since he deleted his social media accounts, he\u2019s stopped comparing himself to others and experiences greater overall satisfaction with his life. He said he hopes to continue to share that with others.<\/p>\n
![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1777479374_73_UCBNoPhones3.jpg\")
Students rally during a game of volleyball on the grass at a phone-free gathering at UC Berkeley on Friday, April 24, 2026.\u00a0Credit: Eliza Peppel\/KQED<\/p>\n
Several students offered each other tips about creating some distance with their phones, including plugging it in out of reach overnight, turning it completely off while socializing, and leaning on a community with like-minded goals to hold each other accountable.<\/p>\n
Kelly said that the movement the students hope to create is about their personal agency.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are the peak years of our lives, and they\u2019ve been stolen from us by companies that are making billions and billions of dollars every single year to take as much of our time as possible. We have to fight back, and we fight back by connecting and engaging in a life that we should have been living from the beginning.\u201d<\/p>\n
Berkeleyside is a media partner of KQED<\/a>, a listener-supported public radio station serving Northern California. Berkeleyside occasionally republishes KQED stories we believe will be of interest to our readers.<\/p>\n“*” indicates required fields<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Students at UC Berkeley set up handwritten signs and played a variety of games during a phone-free party…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":291648,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[2465,2466,143,145,144],"class_list":["post-291647","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-home-highlight","tag-home-lead","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=291647"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291647\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/291648"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=291647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=291647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=291647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1777479372_260_UCBNoPhones4.jpg\")
Students at UC Berkeley set up handwritten signs and played a variety of games during a phone-free party on campus on Friday, April 24. Credit: Eliza Peppel\/KQED<\/p>\n