Lock ‘Em Up (Cellphones)

By Shlomo Maital  

       Lock ‘em up.   Cell phones, that is.

      At last, schools at least are seeing the light.  After students returned to the classroom, following lengthy COVID lockups, the cell phone addiction was ruinous in the classroom.   Reporting on NPR public radio, Rachel Cohen recounts:

      “Restrictions on students’ cellphones are becoming more common in public schools across the country. Florida banned them statewide last year. Indiana’s ban went into effect this school year, as does one in Los Angeles.  We visited a Colorado school in the first week of its new cellphone ban to see how it’s working.

           “ It’s the third day of school at Doherty High in Colorado Springs. Seventeen hundred teenagers filed through the doors as security guard Lonny Barrett checks IDs.

         Barrett:: Good morning. Thank you.  Can I see your phone?

          “According to a new policy, students are given special pouches to keep their phones in all day. Barrett checks each one.   Principal Hillary Hienton explains the gray fabric pouches, designed by a company called Yondr, magnetically lock. Students unlock them at a magnet station at the end of the day. (see Photo above).

         “In the first week, the English teacher reports he’s already noticed a difference. Last year when he gave students a break between lessons, they’d pick up their phones. He notes: “And then this year, every time I give them a five-minute break, they just talk to each other. So then that makes the feel of a community in a classroom way more powerful.”

        “When challenged by parents and students, the Principal simply replies: ‘I care about you, and I care about your education, and I want to make sure that you have the tools and the skills and the competencies that are going to make you successful in life.  Phones are a distraction from that success.’ “

     Overall, students seemed to be OK with this policy, despite the pernicious addictive impact of their cellphones.  

           Wish we could get a few million of those Yondr devices for us adults.