Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 20:26     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
That sounds really odd. At my school we have twenty-five printers, mostly b/w laser and they all work, with one exception. (It's currently being serviced. God bless helpdesk tickets.) The copier machine, on the other hand, is a bit more finicky. But we also use CopyPlus quite a bit for regular jobs. However the bigger issue is still access to paper, which has gotten better in recent months.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 13:10     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:How can MCPS be so stupid as to allow students access to the Internet all day long? Good lord.


Pretty ridiculous. And there’s no stopping it.


I’d love to stop it, but we don’t have the resources to do the curriculum with paper and pencil.

Sometimes the only working printer is in the principal’s conference room. We have 100+ academic staff and 1000+. students


Bingo.
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 10:29     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:How can MCPS be so stupid as to allow students access to the Internet all day long? Good lord.


Pretty ridiculous. And there’s no stopping it.


I’d love to stop it, but we don’t have the resources to do the curriculum with paper and pencil.

Sometimes the only working printer is in the principal’s conference room. We have 100+ academic staff and 1000+. students
Anonymous
Post 07/21/2025 07:48     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:What if you switched your perspective on this? Is it possible that the students were supposed to be writing an essay, creating a presentation, etc., and were sneaking around and playing video games instead? Does your child have a responsibility to be doing what they are supposed to be doing?

There's a line of thinking that some of these video games are addictive. A small group of parents in MCPS has been tearing their hair out about this for years. Their kids have ADHD and are more susceptible to addictive behaviors. The parents are doing everything they can do (meds, after school sports, consequences at home, requesting teachers to move back to paper). It's one of the reasons that parents of means withdraw their kids to private schools.


So are you saying that these children cannot control their behavior in the presence of computers? And the solution to this is to get rid of computers?

A simpler solution would be to give teachers back the ability to give students consequences for misbehavior. I believe we would see that plenty of kids are actually able to control themselves, when they actually have to face consequences when they don’t.


How does this work exactly? In ES, a lot of the screen time happens when teachers are working with small groups. How is the teacher supposed to be working with a group of students while simultaneously monitroing how the remaining students are using the screentime? WHy can't they - gasp- just read books instead?

This stuff is built to be additive- putting it back on young kids to practice self-control is ridiculous.
Anonymous
Post 07/20/2025 20:02     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:How can MCPS be so stupid as to allow students access to the Internet all day long? Good lord.


Kids playing video games aren't brawling in the classroom. It's an improvement.

It's up to parents to train your kids to be better than what MCPS expects.
Anonymous
Post 07/20/2025 17:34     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:How can MCPS be so stupid as to allow students access to the Internet all day long? Good lord.


Pretty ridiculous. And there’s no stopping it.
Anonymous
Post 07/20/2025 11:55     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:We are heading to SSIMS for MS next year- does anyone know what their phone policy/ chrome book usage is like?


Pretty sure the new county wide policy on cell phone usage in middle schools is they cannot be used from bell to bell.
Anonymous
Post 07/20/2025 11:51     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Opt out.
Anonymous
Post 07/20/2025 11:50     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
We are heading to SSIMS for MS next year- does anyone know what their phone policy/ chrome book usage is like?
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 13:37     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
How can MCPS be so stupid as to allow students access to the Internet all day long? Good lord.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 13:34     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
There is a big difference in screen addiction between the schools on the cart model versus the schools that let the kids have their Chromebook on their person all day long like a personal device.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 13:33     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:Programs like GoGuardian and Lightspeed are great for keeping kids off of games and unapproved sites but they basically handcuff teachers to their desks


Not necessarily. If the teacher proactively sets the schedule to limit which websites kids can access they don’t have to be chained to their desk
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 11:21     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Some schools seem better at limiting screens than others. Our DC is at William Tyler Page ES and most in-class work and all homework is on paper or physical workbooks. Chromebook time very limited.

And I heard White Oak MS was one of the first to ban phones before MCPS updated its policies.

I think principals/admin have a lot of discretion on this issue.
Anonymous
Post 07/18/2025 16:38     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:We just opted out, no computer use until high school.

How??


Not possible. Taking assessments like MAP and MCAP requires a computer.
Anonymous
Post 07/18/2025 16:37     Subject: Any hope to minimize screens?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:As a teacher I am planning on going back to pencil and paper assignments for this upcoming school year.


I will as much as possible, but I need up to date textbooks and working copy machines and printers.


And you need copy paper. Hey parents, for teacher appreciation week, give copy paper to your teachers, not bagels.


I would appreciate that. But my own case, please. The same way some of my coworkers take three bagels each and leave nothing for the last lunch period, there won’t be paper left for others if parents just put a case in the office.