Summary
Cellphone bans in schools are gaining bipartisan momentum, with at least eight states, including California, Florida, and Virginia, enacting restrictions to combat classroom distractions and protect children’s mental health.
Governors from both parties, such as Arkansas’ Sarah Huckabee Sanders and California’s Gavin Newsom, support these measures, citing benefits of phone-free school days.
While some parents oppose bans, citing emergencies and transportation needs, proponents argue phones disrupt learning and may pose risks during crises.
States differ on implementation, from outright bans to district-level policies or funding for phone storage solutions.
Assuming they’re struggling to get any teaching done while there are no rules in place, this still seems like a step in the right direction to me. But to answer your question, I suppose that depends on what the rules are, and how they’re enforced. One infraction could mean your phone is taken away for the rest of the day, or until a parent comes to get it – For example. The biggest problem I see with this approach would be that it foists a lot of liability onto the teacher – As in, if there were an emergency situation for the student following the teacher taking their phone away, perhaps the teacher could be held liable in some way. Then again, I think this comes down to the administrative staff having a very clearly defined policy in place.
And if the teacher is subdued? Or if the emergency takes place on school grounds, but outside of the classroom? Etc.
There are many adults in any school and it’s not like the police will do much anyway :(
Right, why stop at banning cell phones when you can ban emergency services altogether?
That is just ridiculous. Emergency services never enter any school, so they can’t disrupt any classes! And IF they do, and that is a pretty fucking big if, I agree with you, we should definitely ban emergency services! And after that we should ban the schools! That’s where all these shootings are happening! Shootings are of cource a natural occurrence might as well try to stop the weather, but schools? A waste of taxpayer money I say, ban them all! And why stop there? We should ban these so called homes as well, that is where home schooling happens! And the vast majority of shootings happens in the home, and combined with these volatile schools it’s clearly completely unsafe. Good call, I think we just solved it.