A simple way to improve public schools would be to institute a complete and total ban of all cell phones and so-called smart watches.  Banning these ubiquitous devices would improve student mental health, reduce cyberbullying, and make schools safer for the most vulnerable students.

As Education Week reported in October, “A growing number of studies have linked children’s use of smartphones and social media to their deteriorating mental health. For instance, a 2023 systematic review of 50 research articles published in the journal BMC Psychology found that screen time was associated with problems in teens’ mental well-being, and that social media was linked to an increased risk of depression in girls.”

Banning cell phones is also supposed to reduce cyberbullying, which is increasingly prevalent among adolescents in schools.  It’s occurring in more than 81% of schools, according to their principals, and it’s getting worse.  In 2010, 37.7% of principals reported NO cyberbullying in their schools–none in close to 40% of our schools–but in 2016 (the most recent data), that ‘Never’ number was cut nearly in half, to 19.1 %. 

What’s not mentioned in the articles I’ve looked at, another elephant in the room, is cheating.  Smartphones and smartwatches make cheating easy as pie. Banning them is a step in the direction of academic integrity.

“Hold on,” some of you may be saying to yourself. “Didn’t I just read that nearly all public schools prohibit students from using cell phones?”

You’re correct: Here’s the most recent data, from the National Center for Education Statistics: “More than three-quarters of schools, 76.9 percent, prohibited non-academic use of cell phones or smartphones during school hours during the 2019-20 school year.”  That’s up nearly 7% from 2010.  

While this sounds impressive, don’t be misled, because the phrase ‘during school hours’ is slushy/squishy at best.  It means that for some unspecified amount of time students were not allowed to use their phones.  What most schools, and the entire state of Florida, have done is institute partial bans, followed by bizarre, almost comical steps, like magnetic pouches outside classroom doors, to enforce their rules.  

What’s not revealed is how much of the day students can use their phones, because it turns out there are loopholes, lots of them: In some schools,  students may use their phones at lunch, in the halls, between classes, in the rest rooms, in study halls, and during extracurricular activities.  Oh, and in their classrooms if the teachers say it’s OK.   

That’s a ban?  

It’s not hard to dig up anecdotal ‘evidence’ from supporters that this policy is working. For example, Brush (CO) School Superintendent Bill Wilson told Education Week, “In between classes, students are talking to students instead of everybody walking with their head down on their phone.” 

But the plural of anecdote is not data, and the data tell a very different story: Cyberbullying actually increases when schools ban cell phones!  Schools that did NOT allow their students to use cell phones had a reportedly higher rate of daily/weekly cyberbullying. 

The incidence nearly doubled!  Partial bans seem to make things worse, not better!

I can imagine the collective mind of teenagers, on learning of the ban, declaring, “So you think that keeping us from using our phones will stop us from being mean?  Good luck with that!”  

What I conclude is that half-hearted, half-way restrictions on cell phones is a half-assed public policy.

What’s required to improve public schools is a complete and total ban.  However,recall that at the top of this essay I wrote ‘simple’ and not ‘easy,’ because it will be very difficult to keep these ubiquitous devices out of schools.

For one thing, the negative step (the ban) must be accompanied by some significant positive steps that will, in time, fill the space now spent on phones.  I would ask educators and policymakers to consider some of my earlier suggested changes, including Extending the Homeroom Period (#7),  Making Stuff (#11), and Serving Your Community (#13).   A longer homeroom period will give students more time to get to know each other, while the real work involved in building things and serving one’s community will provide both personal satisfaction and connections with others that no electronic device can begin to deliver.

(The argument that cellphones are an important educational tool for connecting to the internet does not hold today, because most schools either provide or allow laptop computers.   Banning cellphones and smartwatches will not restrict educational opportunities.)  

The stickiest part will be enforcing a total ban, and here schools might consider embracing step #3,  Practice Democracy.  As everyone who’s spent time in public schools must acknowledge, schools are anti-democratic by nature and design, and that’s what needs to be confronted.  That means telling the truth, by acknowledging openly to students (and the community) that cyberbullying is a real problem, that excessive use of cell phones and social media is harmful, and that some students use the devices to cheat, giving them unfair advantage over their peers.

Then educators must present students with the decision, the fait accompli–no cell phones and no smart watches on campus–and then ask them to help establish both the procedures and the penalties.  

Should the first violation result in a warning, or should the device be confiscated? If confiscated, for how long?  (Apparently many schools now simply take away the phone and give it back at the end of the day.  Day after day….the very definition of toothlessness.)  Should there be escalating penalties for repeated violations?  Should there be a student court, or at least the involvement of students in the judicial process? 

As I said, it won’t be easy, but the rewards of a total ban of smartphones and smartwatches are almost impossible to exaggerate: more open communication, real work, significant connections with others in the school and in the community, and a reduction in bullying.

(Here’s a list of all the steps, so far: Looping;  Play;  Practice Democracy;  Business Cards for Teachers;  Involve Outsiders;  Multiple ‘Talent Nights’;  Extended Homeroom;  Ask the Right Question;  “Education Grand Rounds”;  Looping (revisited);  “Making Stuff”;  Make the School Safe;  Serve Your Community)