With the state of Michigan enacting a cellphone ban this fall that restricts students from using their phones during instructional time, lawmakers have left it up to school districts to create their own policies on how to enforce this ban.
A team of University of Michigan researchers parsed through and compiled data on the policies nearly 800 schools across the state, some of them already in place, to examine the different approaches they are taking to enforce this statewide ban. While many schools have enacted their own approaches to limiting cell phone use in recent years, the data reveals that schools believe there are a number of different ways to keep students off their phones after the bell rings.
U-M Education Policy Professor Brian Jacob said the research is intended to provide guidance on the trade-offs of different approaches as the state law goes into place this fall.
"We want to make sure state leaders and district leaders were cognizant of this as they were imposing mandates on their individual schools because I have a feeling restricting cell phone use in schools is going to be a nuanced, challenging, multi-year process," Jacob said. "This is one big genie that is out of the bottle, and figuring out the best way to get it back in the bottle and stay in the bottle, I think, is going to take a little practice and iteration on the part of schools."
Source: The74
