L.A. Unified and other school districts are suing companies like Meta, Google and TikTok for platforms they say are ‘addictive’ for children.
Meta, Google, TikTok and other social media companies could soon be compelled to fund student mental health services and redesign features alleged to encourage compulsive use if school districts prevail in a growing wave of lawsuits.
More than 1,000 school districts nationwide — including at least a dozen in California, including Los Angeles Unified School District — argue that social media companies knowingly designed products that harm children’s mental health, and that the cost of addressing the harm has shifted to schools, which have had to expand counseling, crisis intervention and campus safety efforts…