It’s the law as of Sept. 1: Texas students on K-12 campuses can’t use their cellphones or personal devices during the school day.
If they do, their teachers and principals can take them away. So far, most local school districts have adopted policies during regular July and August school board meetings and have announced their rules go into effect on the first day of school.
Lawmakers passed House Bill 1481 during the 89th Legislature. The law requires school boards to adopt and enforce a policy that keeps personal communication devices out of students’ hands on campus during the school day.
The law lets school districts decide where students can store their phones. The law requires schools to have disciplinary action in place for students who break the rules, including the possibility of confiscating their phones.
Students who need their phones for medical or safety reasons will be allowed to keep them.
Denton, Argyle, Krum and Ponder school boards have quickly adopted policies. They’ve mostly opted to keep things simple — Students have to turn the devices off and put them away in a backpack or locker when the first bell rings and keep them there until the last bell has rung.
But North Texas administrators and lawmakers know that, for most people who have these devices, they feel indispensable. And parents want to be able to reach their kids. So most of the policies leave room for students to use their personal devices on campus after school.
What counts as a ‘personal wireless communication device’?
Broadly, the law was crafted to target cellphones. Across the country, teachers, administrators and parents have bemoaned the downsides of children and teenagers using smartphones and devices, citing distraction and harm to students’ mental health. Social media has distracted students and, in some cases, has eroded the well-being of teen girls. Harmful material, such as pornography, is easy to find on the internet, and cyberbullying has been the bane of 21st-century teens.
However, school officials have seen problems beyond phones, and districts are including smartwatches and tablets and accessories such as earbuds and headphones in their new policies. Chromebooks and laptops issued to students by the school district are allowed. District technology departments limit what students can access on those computers and maintain security filters on them.
What’s the big deal with these devices?
James Hill, superintendent of Ponder ISD, has plenty of experience with the downsides of this kind of technology and teenagers.
“Many students do not have any type of filters on their phones, so they have immediate access to negative content such as pornography 24/7,” he said in an email exchange. “Younger students especially develop an ‘artificial maturity,’ where they are exposed to more mature content, but they are not emotionally mature enough to handle it.”
The technology has given students another way to skirt rules, Hill said.
“We have situations where students arrange a meetup in the restrooms using cellphones to possibly vape, do drugs or even fight,” he said.
And, like adults, bystanders use their phones to share and, sometimes, shame.
“Students will record poor behavior — such as fighting — rather than intervene or tell an adult,” Hill said. “I could go on and on, but these are the main ones. We discussed getting the pockets or sleeves that cellphones [can] be held in. But, they are costly and since it is now law, we decided just to say that they are prohibited.”
Denton ISD sees results from pilot program limiting device use
Ron Sterling Jr., the principal at Myers Middle School, is part of one of the schools that took part in a Denton ISD pilot program to restrict the use of personal devices. The district launched the program on about a half-dozen campuses.
Sterling said his campus put together its plan with a team of teachers and administrators, and they were careful to include parents.
The program was a forerunner of the district’s new “Unplug to Connect” campaign.
The campaign includes the new rules: Students may bring personal communication devices to school but will be required to turn them off or silence them and store them in backpacks or lockers during the instructional day. The policy covers cellphones, laptops, tablets, smartwatches and smart glasses, paging devices and alternative devices.
“Unplug to Connect builds on the strong foundation already present in our schools — where relationships, engagement and academic focus are valued every day,” Denton ISD Superintendent Susannah O’Bara said. “This campaign encourages students to be even more present in their learning and interactions, creating space for deeper thinking, stronger connections and enriched classroom experiences.”
Sterling said that at his campus, devices are everywhere.
“I would say the vast majority of our students have a mobile device,” said Sterling, who rose through the ranks from teacher to superintendent. He’s acquainted with the classroom and student behavior.
“I would say the cons are, of course, the connectivity,” he said. “We want students to be locked into our instructional day. The student-teacher relationship is vital for student outcomes. We wanted to come up with something that does allow us to optimize the time these students spend in the classroom.”
Myers Middle School had a policy on personal devices before the pilot program, as did every other campus in the district. The policies mostly looked like the new law. No phones or devices out (or under desks) and in use during class.
For the pilot program, Sterling said, the team sought an educational approach to devices. Pay attention in class, and if a student was caught with a device, Sterling said “progressive discipline” kicked in. That means teachers, staff and administrators worked with students to get to the root of the rule breaking. Instead of immediately removing the student from the classroom, school leaders would assign a course for the student to complete, and their parents or guardians were alerted.
Sterling said his aim was to pilot a program that works with the school’s culture and prioritizes student outcomes above all else.
“I would say that we put that instructional time above all else,” he said. “Any time you have a student leave the classroom and removed from the classroom, they aren’t getting that instructional time we want to give them.”
Sterling said the program got good feedback from parents, many of whom are wanting to make sure screens aren’t taking over their children’s lives. Sterling said the program included parents, helped them work through their students’ relationship to personal devices, and included parents’ questions and concerns about the program.
“It was a system for students and parents,” Sterling said. “If there was a tech violation, we would assign them a technology course that helps them understand the downsides of their technology. ... Eventually, the kids themselves started taking ownership.”
Dealing with emergencies (and after-school life)
The law means that parents will have to go through their campus office in emergencies, whether a campus is locked down, or a family emergency means a student will be getting checked out of school in moments. If students see a fight, or hear about something concerning, they will have to tell a staff member, a teacher or an administrator.
Districts are giving students grace to use devices in the event of emergencies where staff members can’t be reached.
Ponder officials put it this way in the FAQ section for their policy:
“We want families to know that our intent is not to punish students for trying to do the right thing,” the explanation states.
“We recognize that unexpected situations can happen, and we will approach those moments with common sense and care. At the same time, we are working to follow the law as required and ask for your support in keeping personal device use limited to true emergencies only.”
Ultimately, school leaders hope that the law will get students connecting more face-to-face. Krum ISD Superintendent Jason Cochran and some Bobcat marching band students had some fun with it and produced a video the district posted on Facebook, along with their new policy.
The short video goes through a number of cheeky scenarios — a pair of boys dropping their fists because there’s no one to film them, two girls sitting separately because one “unfriended” the other ... in person (they make up moments later). And finally, Cochran walks into the high school cafeteria and looks confused at tables full of students.
“What are y’all doing?” he asks, as if witnessing an alien invasion. The students look at him and answer, in unison.
“We’re talking.”
LUCINDA BREEDING-GONZALES can be reached at 940-566-6877 and cbreeding@dentonrc.com.
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