Niru Shivakumar
Bio: Niru Shivakumar is a junior at Leland High School in San Jose and a rower for NorCal Crew in Redwood City. Since 2021, she has run Offline organization, a nonprofit aimed at battling phone addiction related mental health issues in young students. She began the organization because of her own personal experiences and has spoken out at several schools across the Bay Area. She loves to play sports and read books, which she believes is the better alternative than social media these days. She wants to continue Offline in the future and expand it even more to reach students in other countries as well. Offline’s program is an interactive, age-appropriate presentation for in person visits and an informative fun video for online visits that dives into the dangers of constant social media use that also describes and provides ways to stay healthier without the Internet. Offline also has its own newsletter, where they send out issues every 2 weeks about new technological advancements and new alternatives to stay happy without social media. During in person visits, the program combines fun games with the same theme to keep students engaged and help them understand the ideas better. www. offlineorganization.
