While I’m not particularly big on social media, there has been a trend that has caught my interest this year (please accept my apologies if I’m woefully behind the times). It’s the ‘What were you like in the 90s…’ trend. As someone who completed all my years of high school in the 90s, I find it fascinating. It has made me reflect on how some things have changed completely and how some things remain the same. Here are some reflections on the differences and similarities I see between my own experiences of attending high school and what I see in the lives of William Clarke College students today.
The things that have changed
The internet
This is probably the most obvious change. I think it’s hard to imagine exactly how much this has changed the way people connect. I grew up with my grandparents in Switzerland. Yes, you could call them on the phone, but it was crazily expensive. If I wanted to write to them, I would have to write a letter by hand, send it in the mail, and it would take a week to get there, then another week to wait for the response. Email made this instant and virtually free (not that my Swiss grandparents ever got email). There were only 5 TV channels in Sydney, and if you wanted to watch something, you had to watch what they were showing at that time. This offering might seem unthinkingly narrow in 2026, but it actually has some upsides. It meant that everyone at school would watch similar things. Thursday mornings, everyone might come to school to discuss last night’s episode of The X-Files; Friday morning,g everyone might retell the jokes they heard on Fast Forward. Nobody had ever heard of binge-watching. There was much less to watch, but everyone watched largely the same shows at the same time, and so people generally knew what everyone else was watching. Watching TV was an experience shared by the whole community.
In my opinion, the most significant thing the internet does is reduce distance to zero. I can be connected anywhere in the world, instantly, with the internet. On the one hand, this is incredibly liberating. We have access to knowledge, experience,ce and people that we could only dream of in the 90s. Young people today can learn so much and connect with people and cultures so easily, and this is fantastic. I have been able to show my kids videos of Swiss music and television shows to connect them with their family heritage that I never could have experienced myself without being in Switzerland.
But the flipside of this is that people are no longer ‘forced’ to connect with the people who live around them. The strengthening of global communities has come at the expense of local connections. What is a show that all WCC students watch? It’s hard to say because everyone can choose from the limitless options out there (usually prompted by differing algorithms), which makes it harder for the whole community to have genuinely shared experiences. This is why I think school is so important, because it’s a place where people can connect ‘IRL’. We are learning that face-to-face connection is so important for our mental, physical, and spiritual health, so we need to be careful about how we choose to connect with people around us, locally and globally.
Boredom
Humans don’t like boredom. When we are bored, it drives us to do something to break the boredom. In 2026, there are just so many ways that boredom can be broken quickly and easily. They usually involve a smartphone. Every small gap without entertainment or mind stimulation can be filled with a message, a song, an article, a podcast,t or a reel. Back in the 90s, life was more boring. You had to learn to cope with waiting without much to keep you occupied while waiting for the bus. Or waiting for the doctor. Or waiting for the next interesting TV show to come on. Kids back then were able to cope with boredom better than today. We had no choice.
But boredom also drove kids to take initiative more. I remember on the weekend in Primary School going through my list of friends and calling them (on a corded landline phone) until one was free so we could ride bikes together. We might discover new trails to ride, create (rickety) jump-ramps to go over, make up new games, or create silly skits. In other words, boredom encouraged kids to be creative. I think this was a very good thing. So for WCC students today, don’t be afraid to embrace boredom… at least the boredom that drives us to do new and creative things.
It was awkward
One of the things I’ve noticed about young people in 2026 is that there is something that people are terrified of: that is when things get awkward. Saying something silly, wearing the wrong thing, seeing someone unexpectedly with whom there might be some unresolved tension… all these things can be awkward. It seems to me that today,ay for most kids, awkwardness is to be avoided at all costs.
Awkward situations certainly happened in the 90s, but they didn’t seem to me to be as much of a big deal. Sure, it might make you feel a little strange or embarrassed. But it seemed to be something you might laugh about and move on. Sometimes it was a positive thing because you would have an interesting story to share (to relieve the copious amounts of boredom, as noted above!). Looking back, the thing I noticed is that the more awkward situations you go through, the less awkwardness seems to worry you. Pushing through an awkward conversation could actually be the very thing you needed to do to make a new friend, ask someone on a date, or help someone who really needed help. Leaning into awkwardness could just change your life!
The things that have stayed the same
People are mostly just the same.
For all the ways that people connect now, such as through smartphones and social media, people behave mostly the same way. People love to make friends. People try to impress others. People can perform amazing acts of love and kindness. People can find others annoying. And funny. And loyal. People have a tendency to put themselves first. People make mistakes and can find it hard to say sorry, particularly when they are proud. While personal interactions today might come through a meme, a like, or a DM, the basic shape of human interactions is just the same. Which is why there is so much wonderful stuff humans can relate to from ages past (such as Shakespeare – and yes, I know you might find it boring now, but rest assured, at some point you are likely to realise why we are still reading Shakespeare today). As we read in the Bible, ‘There is nothing new under the sun’. (Ecclesiastes 1:9b). Humans have always been basically the same and will always basically be the same.
People long for acceptance
There is a driving human need that I don’t think has changed at all: the need to be accepted. Kids back in the 90s wanted to fit in. Kids wanted to have people who took an interest in them. Kids wanted to find acceptance and belonging. I don’t think that has changed at all and will ever change. Strong relationships, particularly with friends and family, are a huge driver of motivation and behaviour. Then as now, people work really hard to achieve something to find acceptance. Or feel a deep emptiness when they feel they don’t have a place to belong or people who accept them. That is why I think relationships are so important. For me, the most significant relationship and place I find acceptance is through my relationship with Jesus. This is something I discovered in high school. In fact, this was the most important thing I learned at school and has shaped the course of the rest of my life (in a very good way!).
So, I would encourage everyone in 2026 to remember the importance of relationships. Firstly, everyone might see the wonderfully good thing you can do by showing care and acceptance to other people, even if they can be a little bit awkward or annoying. And secondly, acceptance and belonging are natural, and the most reliable way it can be found is through Jesus, who will accept everyone no matter who they are and what they’ve done. That has been my experience.
Growth comes through challenging experiences.
As we increasingly try to reduce boredom, suffering and inconvenience (hello, Uber Eats), we can’t escape the fact that growth only ever happens through the challenges we face. We know our bodies will only get stronger and fitter if we exercise. We know our minds will only get smarter if we use them to think. In the same way, our character will only get stronger as we face challenges. When things are hard, we get better and stronger.
I remember in the 90s, just after school, travelling through Europe for half a year. It was amazing! But it was challenging. I had no mobile phone. No internet. Phone calls anywhere were made through public phone booths, and calling Australia was phenomenally expensive. My only resource was a single paperback travel guide. Backpacker accommodation was cheap, dirty, and shared. By today’s standards, it was incredibly spartan and would hardly pass today’s health and safety laws. But through these limitations, I was forced to solve problems creatively, such as how to order food in a different language and find shelter on the fly. One night, I had to walk around the streets overnight because every hotel and hostel bed in the city was occupied. It was hard, but it was an adventure that helped me learn so many skills and learn how to connect with people, even if we didn’t quite speak the same language. I felt so much better for having had the adventure.
I see the same things are true at WCC today. Students grow so much when things are hard. I recently saw the presentation for the Gold Duke of Edinburgh Award trip to the Northern Territory. Gee, it looked tough! But to see the smiles and sense of achievement on the faces of all the students who came through it – that was priceless. I love seeing people growing like this every day at school.
So what…?
I want to make clear that I am not suggesting that the 90s were better or worse than today. It was just different. We knew far less than we do about issues around the world and had less access to information, particularly from overseas. But there were some good things that came from those restrictions, such as boredom and the desire to solve problems creatively. I hope this is something which perhaps might be interesting to readers today.
My encouragement for WCC students in 2026 is always to challenge yourself, lean heavily into relationships, take every opportunity to do something in person, and to remember that fostering a sense of community and belonging is one of the most important things you can do in life. God made each one of us relational beings, and while technology and fashions may evolve as time goes by, our fundamental human needs remain the same. So make the most of every day… whatever the situation, there is always something to learn and an opportunity to grow.
