Education Week - September 11, 2019 - 10

Cellphone Bans: Smart Move or Relic of the Past?
allowing students to spend so much
time on their devices, they are feeding
an addiction and stunting students'
development of face-to-face communication skills.
That was a big reason why the Forest Hills district, near Grand Rapids,
Mich., decided at the start of this
school year to ban cellphones throughout the school day, even during lunch.
"We really wanted to provide a
clean break for students and not have
the frenetic energy that can happen
if kids start texting each other or
social-media posts start going," said
Dan Behm, the superintendent. The
district piloted the ban last school
year and found that students said
they were less anxious when they
weren't so attached to their devices,
Behm added.
More than 30 schools, or in some
cases, entire districts have enacted
or stepped up some sort of cellphone
restrictions beginning in either the
2018-19 school year or the start of this
academic year, according to an Education Week analysis.
California recently passed legislation that allows school districts to restrict or prohibit device use in class,
although it's not a requirement. And
at least four other states debated putting significant limits on the devices.
Other countries have had more
success enacting widespread bans.
Ontario, a Canadian province, is restricting student cellphone use during
instructional time. (The restrictions,
which are scheduled to go into effect
later this year, include an exception
for classroom activities and health
and other emergencies.) And in 2018,
France passed a law outlawing the use
of cellphones in schools for students
up to age 15.
But banning cellphones can come
with its own vexations. Enforcement
can be difficult, and districts are wary
of taking on liability for holding a student's confiscated phone. Many teachers like using some cellphone-based
applications in class, such as online
microscopes and polling applications.
What's more, some experts say it's
better to keep cellphones in school and
help train students how to use them
responsibly, rather than just banning
their use.
Plenty of educators agree.
Brian Toth, the superintendent of
Saint Mary's Area school district in
northwestern Pennsylvania, said
he'd never consider nixing student cellphone use in school-even
though some of his teachers have
asked him to do so.
Toth said the devices can be a great
teaching tool. Educators in his district
check for student understanding using
cellphone applications like Kahoot, or
they send their students on scavenger hunts that also rely on cellphone
technology. And the district's instructional-technology coach focuses on
teaching students to use their devices
responsibly.
"Anybody who wants to ban it is just
hiding from reality," Toth said. "It's

just common, everyday practice these
days that you have a cellphone."
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Parents' Big Concerns
Restricting cellphone use is a lot
easier said than done. There are
big concerns, for instance, about
school safety. How could parents
get in touch with their children during a school shooting or a dangerous
weather event?
One school in Wisconsin had a
low-tech solution: Families could call
the front office, just like they did before cellphones were so ubiquitous,
said Jo-Ellen Fairbanks, the assistant
principal of Portage High School,
which requires students to keep their
cellphones in their lockers during the
school day.
And during an emergency, students are best off making sure they
concentrate on following through
with a safety plan, not staring at their
cellphone screens, said Adam Gelb,
the assistant principal of San Mateo
High School near San Francisco,
which recently required students to
keep their cellphones in a pouch that
renders them inoperable during the
school day.

There are times it
would be easier to
just ban [phones]
altogether, but we
don't want to
communicate to
kids that school
isn't relevant to
their lives. We're
trying to help them
use it in an
appropriate and
meaningful way."
STEVE MATTHEWS
superintendent, Novi Community
school district

Ray Stewart/ CantonRep.com

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Students at Minerva High School in
Ohio retrieve their cellphones after
an English class. They must store
their phones before class starts.

What's more, enforcing a ban can
bring with it its own set of administrative hasssles. The nation's largest school district, New York City,
dropped its cellphone ban in 2015, in
part because it was being enforced
more harshly in lower-income schools
than more advantaged ones.
The Marshall school district, in the
southwestern corner of Minnesota,
also dropped its cellphone ban several
years ago.
What the policy largely prompted
was kids texting under their desks or
hiding their phones under big sweatshirts, said Principal Brian Jones.
A total ban "sounds great, I just don't
think it's realistic. I don't like to have
unenforceable policies," Jones said.
What's more, he added, "for some
students, the anxiety of not having
that device with them caused more
harm than good. It reminded me of
the cartoon [Peanuts and] Charlie
Brown and Linus with his blanket."
Now, the district allows students
to use their phones after school, during lunch, and at some times during
the school day, if it is for educational
purposes. "They've got to learn how
to self-regulate once they leave us,"
Jones said.

'Have a Plan, Not a Ban'
"Nowhere in any [safety protocol]
does it say get on your cellphone and
notify a family member," he said.
But some parents want to be able to
reach their children at any time-even
if it means texting them in class, educators say.
Reaction from families to a recent
ban on cellphones in the Warwick district near Providence, R.I., has been
mixed. Some are supportive. Others
"have said, 'You can tell us what to do
when you pay our phone bill,' " said
Karen Bachus, the chairwoman of the
school board.

10 | EDUCATION WEEK | September 11, 2019 | www.edweek.org

That philosophy jibes with recommendations from Common Sense
Media, a nonprofit based in San Francisco that focuses on children, technology, and media.
In an April survey, Common Sense
found that 80 percent of schools implement some kind of cellphone policy. About a quarter of teachers find
cellphone policies difficult to follow,
while roughly two-thirds find them
easy to follow, according to the survey. High school teachers were more
likely to report that implementing
cellphone policies was difficult.

Cellphone-Restriction Legislation
Canada's Ontario province and France have enacted
significant restrictions on student cellphone use in schools.
But measures restricting cellphone use have been much
harder to pass in the United States. Here's a list of the states
that have recently considered some sort of student cellphone
restriction:
CALIFORNIA: Allows school districts or charter schools to limit
or prohibit the use of smartphones during school hours. Status:
Enacted.
ARIZONA: Called for a public policy that portable electronic
devices should not be used in classrooms unless specifically
authorized by "the individual having authority over the public
school classroom." Status: Failed
MAINE: Required the department of education to adopt rules
restricting the use of cellphones by students. Allowed students
to use their cellphones in the front office of the school in the
event of an emergency. Status: Failed.
MARYLAND: Established a task force to study the impact of
student cellphone use in classrooms on student learning and
teacher instruction and report its findings to the legislature.
Status: Failed.
UTAH: Required individual public schools to develop a policy
on the use of cellphones in school and submit that policy to
district officials every two years. Status: Failed
SOURCE: National Conference of State Legislatures; Education Week

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Education Week - September 11, 2019

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