No Funding Until No Phones

The schools can't stand up to the parents. The taxpayers must.

If you read the history of cell phones in schools, you’ll know who to blame for the lack of cell phone bans. It’s not the teachers or the administrators. It’s the parents.

The parents want access to little Sharif at all times. He must have his phone. They say this is for safety but how does his phone keep him safe? In the event of a school shooting, phones would make it less safe, not more.

Here is how it really works:

In the middle of his seventh grade class, while the teacher is attempting to teach an English lesson, Sharif jumps up and says, “My mom is calling me!” and runs out of the room.

“My mom is calling me,” is the universal excuse for why they have to have their phones. I wanted to scream, “Barack Obama is calling me but I’m gonna let him go to voicemail because I am at work!” But no. Mom above all.

Mom is not calling for safety. Nine times out of ten Mom is not calling for any reason that could not wait until after school. Maybe she’s mad that Sharif didn’t take out the trash. At best, it’s a change in who is picking up whom. All of these pieces of information could wait until after school. But no, Mom has to tell Sharif right now.

Sharif runs out of the room. All the kids are distracted. The teacher has to take two minutes to get their attention (such as it is) back.

Sharif comes back in. He looks downtrodden. Mom yelled at him. Now Sharif will not be able to concentrate on his lesson. A day of English class is lost for Sharif because Mom had to have access to him right then.

That’s the best case scenario. Here’s what is happening more often:

— a 12th grade girl is looking at a picture of a naked man on her phone

— half the class is playing a video game on their phone

— beautiful, sweet Jana in the tenth grade is distraught. I keep telling her to put her phone away. But she’s in a text war with someone about something, likely a boy. Finally, I call the Dean and he takes her phone. “But Ms. Smith, I’m going through something.” I get it, honey, but you’re in school.

— the kids are making TikTok videos of their dances because they think they will make a living as influencers

— a boy is bragging to his buddies about his girl. Another boy claims that the young lady is not his girl. One says he will call her. This is on school hours! I say, “Gentlemen, here we draw the line. You will not bother this young lady and distract her from her studies.” I call the Dean. She takes the phone.

— the boys prank call some store - from math class

— kids are in the bathroom making Tik Tok videos. For a long, long time when they should be in class.

— a seventh grader sees porn on an older kids’ phone

If you think these things only happen when a sub is in the room, think again. The regular teachers spend half their time fighting the phones too. “Put your phone away!”

Adults can’t resist the draw of that Godforsaken object in their pocket. How can we expect children to?

This is insane. Your tax dollars and mine are paying for kids to be on cell phones! Or for their attention to be constantly drawn away. Is that what you thought you were funding when you decided public education was a good idea?

This could easily be solved. 24 states have bell to bell bans. The devil is in the details, of course. Jonathan Haidt (on whom I have a big crush having binge read his entire blog) describes the ways to test if cell phone bans are working.

At one school where I worked, halfway through the year the principal began a policy of taking the kids’ phones at the start of the day and returning them at the end. All of a sudden, I had the kids’ attention sometimes!!! I saw the difference. Kids who previously spent all their time trying to sneak their phone out of their pocket to continue the group chat could pay a tiny bit of attention to the stated purpose of education: learning.

For cell phone bans to work, the phone must not be in the child’s possession, at all. Not in pocket, not in locker. It must be left at home or stored away, such as in the main office, all day.

Could you keep your phone in your purse or pocket or briefcase all day if you were told to? No, and you’re an adult.

The children go through some angst when they first meet a ban, but soon you hear them laughing and talking on recess and at lunch instead of staring at their phones. And the teachers’ collective blood pressure goes from near stroke level to almost normal.

The schools cannot make this happen alone. The state must. The schools will not say to the parents, “No, you can not yell at poor little Sharif on school time and by the way he’s watching porn on lunch,” to the parents. But the state government can.

Governor Shapiro is firmly in favor of the ban. It’s working its way through the legislature.

There is no doubt that cell phone bans will improve the education of our students. But for me, it goes beyond that.

What, really, is the point of public education?

Are schools places where young people of all backgrounds will learn the basics of literacy and math, science, history and civics, and hopefully art, music, and other subjects?

Or are they day cares for kids of all ages, where kids are entitled to do whatever they want on taxpayer money?

If it’s the later, I don’t want to fund it. Or fund it more cheaply by dropping the pretense and getting rid of the teachers. Just make it an all day gym and arcade if we’re not going to require that the students engage in learning.

We’ve gotten so used to the idea that public education is a right that it’s become more of an entitlement. Parents can send their kids somewhere all day, which at least gets the kids off the streets. But if we don’t require something of the students, it’s just a daycare.

Want kids to learn to read and write?

Get rid of the phones.

Let this dragon eat them all.