US Educators Increasingly Urge Total Phone Bans in Schools
2024-03-06
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1American educators and lawmakers are calling for complete bans on smartphone use by students in schools.
2Most U.S. schools already have rules restricting phone use in class. But administrators and teachers say the measures are difficult to enforce.
3Educators across the United States say students are using their phones to do many things that can distract their attention during class.
4These include sending messages, gaming, listening to music, watching videos, checking social media and shopping.
5Studies in recent years have confirmed high smartphone usage by young people in America.
6But an increasing number of educators and experts are now beginning to agree that total bans are necessary to solve the problem.
7Leaders and lawmakers in a growing number of states have also called for complete phone bans or suggested new ways to limit their use in class.
8James Granger is a science teacher at a Los Angeles, California high school.
9He recently told The Associated Press (AP), "Students used to have an understanding that you aren't supposed to be on your phone in class. Those days are gone."
10Granger requires students attending his class to place their phones in a special container.
11"The only solution that works is to physically remove the cellphone from the student," Granger said.
12The latest state intervention on phones in schools came last month in Utah.
13Governor Spencer Cox, a Republican, urged all school districts and the Board of Education to remove cellphones from classrooms.
14He explained that studies had repeatedly shown students do better in school when their phones are not available.
15The studies, Cox noted, found that learning improves, distractions are decreased, and students are more likely to talk to each other if their phones are taken away.
16"We just need a space for six or seven hours a day where kids are not tethered to these devices," Cox told reporters.
17He said his urging, which does not have the force of law, is part of a larger legislative push to protect children from social media harms.
18Patrick Truman is a high school teacher in Maryland who bans student phone use during class.
19"Cellphone use is out of control," he told the AP.
20"By that, I mean that I cannot control it, even in my own classroom."
21Truman bought a container that can hold 36 phones.
22But he says that still, every day, students find ways to hide their phones so they can still use them.
23Last year, Florida became the first state to strongly restrict phones in schools.
24A law took effect in July that requires all public schools in the state to ban student cellphone use and block social media services during class.
25Some school districts went a step further and banned phones for the whole school day.
26Oklahoma, Vermont and Kansas also recently introduced what is becoming known as "phone-free schools" legislation.
27Two U.S. senators - Tom Cotton, an Arkansas Republican, and Tim Kaine, a Virginia Democrat - introduced federal legislation in December.
28The legislation would require a government study on how phone use by students affects their mental health and school progress.
29The National Center for Education Statistics reports that nationally, 77 percent of U.S. schools say they currently ban phones for non-school use.
30Education experts, however, say that number is misleading.
31That is because it does not mean students are actually following the rules or that all the schools are enforcing them.
32Many educators and experts say that, for a school phone ban to work, school administrators must be the ones to enforce it.
33Some students say such policies take away their autonomy and cut off their main method of communication with family and friends.
34Opposition has also come from parents who fear they could be cut off from their children if there is a school emergency.
35Kim Whitman is a leader of the Phone-Free Schools Movement, a group that advises schools.
36She told the AP she urges educators to make exceptions for students with special educational and medical needs.
37I'm Bryan Lynn.