The schoology app has recently been banned due to “operating issues” throughout district 196. The closure of this vital app has left the student community in ruins as a valuable scholarly crutch has unjustly been seized. The schoology app has proved to have been far superior than the web browser edition in both convenience and function to the student body. While the app has a streamlined process that allows for the direct submission of files and resources, the online web browser lacks an ergonomic design. 
 The immediate issue at hand is the unjust banning of the app. The administration has preformed a fiat accompli, banning the app with a pretext of operating issue while ignoring the truth. In reality the banning of the app stems from the mismanaging of students at a middle school level. We know this because devices not administered by the district have experienced no change in the functionality of the schoology app. The administration would rather ban the app outright (barring all of us a valuable tool) than properly address a systemic issue of indecent behaviors. The blanket banning of the app not only presents a scholarly roadblock to the student body but it also stands as a direct violation of international law. Article 33 of the 1949 Geneva convention states that “Protected persons may not be punished for actions they have not themselves performed. Collective punishment of a whole group is also prohibited.” By punishing the student body as a group the harms of the apps banning are exemplified to the community as a whole while the core behavioral issues go unaddressed. 
 But this only matters if it can be proven that the schoology app is unequivocally better… which it is. In the field of function the schoology app holds a number of superior functionalities. Because of the apps integration into the iOS system of many devices it is able to use the large amount of features that drastically improve quality of use. Some features that are present because of this integration that aren’t present in the web browser are the use of notifications, the use of a camera for the submission of assignments, and a more powerful engine of use that increases its reliability. While a number of other features also exist these are the most important. They are features that aren’t present on the web browser. Without them the web browser feels slow an clunky with the submission of resources being extremely convoluted. On top of this the the web browser has its own downgrades when it comes to its design. The layout of the web browser is far from appealing. It lacks convenience inhibiting its functionality. Additionally it’s slow. Because you have to run it on a browser you can not rely on the far more stable iOS of you device. Even further it’s flaws continue to plague the student body. A common grevience is the fact that instability in the web browser causes the site to constantly refresh causing a sustained need to log in continually. This is very inconvenient.

At the end of the day the banning of the schoology app is a detriment to the student body of district 196. It was an unesseary ban that will change nothing about the behavior of students while limiting our scholarly capacity. So I ask all that have a grievance with the ban to sign this petition and make the school board hear our demands to unblock the schoology app.