Virginia wants public schools to ban phones by 2025
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The Virginia Department of Education is giving school districts until New Year's Day to ban student cell phone use.
Why it matters: The goal is to reduce K-12 students' exposure to their phones, which has been tied to distracted learning and increased anxiety and depression via social media usage.
Driving the news: The finalized guidance released Tuesday is largely unchanged from the draft last month, which the VDOE created at the direction of Gov. Youngkin's executive order in July.
What's the same:
For all schools: Students and parents should use school-based tools to communicate with each other during the school day.
- Districts should establish protocols for off-campus events like field trips and sports games.
- The policies should include exemptions for English learners or students with disabilities who need it for educational purposes.
Elementary schools: Cell phones aren't allowed at all, but if parents want students to have one, it must be turned off and stored away.
Middle schools: Students can't have cell phones between the first and last bells of the day, including lunch time and in between classes.
High schools: Same as middle schools but they can use their phones on campus before and after school.
What's different:
The final guidance notes the public feedback from the last month, which included 6,000 comments.
- Students overwhelmingly asked to use their phones during lunch. The VDOE said no.
- Parents were concerned about being able to contact their kid during emergencies, like a lockdown.
The guidance asks schools to create crisis plans that take into account the new cell phone-free policies and make sure parents are notified if an emergency happens.
- For lockdowns and school shooter situations, updates should happen every 10 minutes, per the guidance.
Between the lines: Parents, teachers and officials largely clash with students on cell phone-free policies.
- In a March presentation to Richmond School Board about RPS' pilot program, which restricted cell phones in six schools starting earlier this year, 41% of staff said the pilot wasn't successful compared to 81% of students.
- Staff said students were more engaged and socializing more, while students said they felt more unfocused and stressed.
What's next: The VDOE will review the guidance's impact and how it can improve at the end of the 2024-2025 school year.
- RPS has a survey available for feedback.is also having listening sessions from 6-7:30pm at River City Middle on Sept. 30 and a virtual session on Oct. 9. There's also a survey available for feedback.
Go deeper: New year, new rules for Richmond-area public schools