Getting phones out of classrooms

[Anonymous]

I signed!

[Anonymous]

This is so important.

[Anonymous]

I work at a middle with the 'away all day' program. I think I have seen less than 10 phones all year. It has been a game changer. Haven't heard of any parent complaints.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I work at a middle with the 'away all day' program. I think I have seen less than 10 phones all year. It has been a game changer. Haven't heard of any parent complaints.

This sounds amazing. What school?
I wish this could be implemented in mcps high schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I work at a middle with the 'away all day' program. I think I have seen less than 10 phones all year. It has been a game changer. Haven't heard of any parent complaints.

That sounds amazing

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I work at a middle with the 'away all day' program. I think I have seen less than 10 phones all year. It has been a game changer. Haven't heard of any parent complaints.

Agreed. I know the phones are out, and I’ve seen/taken a few in the hallways, but in my classroom? None. Granted, they have smartwatches that they check now and then, but those also get confiscated if they’re blatantly using them.

If your true issue is safety, let your kid carry their phone turned off or out of sight. We don’t do bag checks or pat downs, if the kids are smart and don’t let us see them most of us honestly don’t care. The issue is usage in class, not pure existence.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hi MCPS parents:

I hope you'll consider signing this letter of support for an "Away All Day" cell phone policy: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe9PxONQlAumVvvUyUqbxHjyykRipMXiILJlzFgc1xPzJE4cA/viewform

MCPS is already behind the growing wave of districts nationwide (and worldwide) that have ruled students should not have access to phones during the school day. (Including Howard County, MD, and all of VA.) Our kids' safety, learning, and socio-emotional outcomes will benefit from this change. As just one example, US students' academic skills increased steadily for 50 years until the widespread introduction of smartphones in 2012, and have been declining ever since. We need to reverse this change.

None of us needed phones in schools as kids and would have found the idea of having constant access to a phone, messaging, video games, and movies throughout the school day ridiculous. Because it is!

If you would like to see for yourself what changes a policy like this yields, please watch this short Today Show clip about the "away all day" policy enacted in the Dayton County public schools: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItnhWeP-om4

Hey if you don't want your kid to have a phone in the classroom don't give them one. It's easy. You don't need to force this on everyone esle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NO. How about you parent your kids and you decide whats best for them and let us parent our kids and decide whats best for our kids. There are so many issues in MCPS. How is this your priority? How about fixing safety first?

Because it's a community, not just your selfish ass by itself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NO. How about you parent your kids and you decide whats best for them and let us parent our kids and decide whats best for our kids. There are so many issues in MCPS. How is this your priority? How about fixing safety first?

Schools are safer when kids don’t have phones.

No, they aren’t given there is no accountability in schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NO. How about you parent your kids and you decide whats best for them and let us parent our kids and decide whats best for our kids. There are so many issues in MCPS. How is this your priority? How about fixing safety first?

Because it's a community, not just your selfish ass by itself.

If it were a community the things happening wouldn’t and parents would care for their own kids.

[Anonymous]

It sucks mcps had to retaliate on so many teachers and ruin so many careers before they made rules such as no cell phones and no attacking the teachers/students and class with violence. It used to be no reporting anything and it all needs to be hush hush or teachers are fired type thing.

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately, we live in a free society where kids can have cell phones. If we lived under a dictatorship, we could be private property like cell phones. Is the cell phone issue part of the project 2025 plan?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Unfortunately, we live in a free society where kids can have cell phones. If we lived under a dictatorship, we could be private property like cell phones. Is the cell phone issue part of the project 2025 plan?

this is incoherent, but there's no right to carry phones in schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here: I'm the mom of a 9th grader at Blair, and this was shared with me by a Whitman mom. It's just a grassroots effort from a bunch of MCPS parents trying to gather support.

Why not list their names? Why do others feel they have to police what other families do? The kids will just use their chromebooks.

RE: Chromebooks — Yes, kids can still district themselves in class, taking away phones is not a magic wand to solve everything, but it’s a start: partial improvements are still meaningful and worthwhile.