Indiana schools respond to new law limiting cell phones in the classroom

Students and staff at school districts across Indiana were welcomed back to school this year with a new law on cellphone use.

Senate Bill 185, which became law on July 1, requires school corporations and charter schools to adopt a policy that prohibits students from using cellphones in the classroom. For students who haven’t known a world without the handheld device, the change is just that: a change, but one that many say is warranted and necessary for student learning and cooperation.

A fall 2023 study by the Pew Research Center found that 33% of surveyed kindergarten through 12th grade teachers in the United States say their students being distracted by cellphones is a major issue. Of those surveyed, 72% of high school teachers say the distraction is a problem.

Administrators across the country are taking action.

The same study found that 82% of teachers said their school or district has implemented policies on student phone use in the classroom. 56% of respondents said these policies are at least somewhat easy to enforce.

In Indiana, the new law takes a generalized approach on how districts should restrict cellphone use.

According to its language, cellphones must be prohibited during instruction time except in emergencies or for educational purposes.

In addition, districts must make these policies easily accessible on their website.

Beyond that, it’s up to administrators to determine how cellphones should be kept out of students’ hands at the district level.

The cellphone policy in the Penn-Harris-Madison School Corporation doesn’t adopt more than what the law calls for, Lucha Ramey, director of communications for the district, said in an email.

A new policy in Indianapolis Public Schools is similar, though policy there includes a clause about seeking permission to use a phone, IPS media relations coordinator Marc Ransford said in an email.

“A principal may also allow individual students to use their cellphones during the school day with written requests from a guardian,” the policy reads.

Lawrence Township’s approach

At the Metropolitan School District of Lawrence Township, student cellphones are to be turned off and tucked away in backpacks during classroom instruction.

Following the state law’s language, the school district makes exceptions on cellphone use when a teacher allows it as part of the class, in the event of an emergency, or to manage student health care.

To develop the new policy, administrators with the school district relied heavily on parent feedback to guide their decision-making.

The school district collected surveys filled out by parents with their thoughts on how cellphones should or shouldn’t be used during the school day, said Dana Altemeyer, the district’s communications director.

More than 60% of surveys relayed the same message.

“Parents overwhelmingly wanted their children to have their device but not have it on them and put away in your backpack. We wrote our policy around them being put away, not just silenced, but put away during instructional time,” Altemeyer said.

Some parents, however, expressed concern for how to reach their children in the event of an emergency if their phones were put away.

But the MSD of Lawrence Township handbook addresses that concern head-on.

“Parents who need to speak to their child should call the main office, not the child’s phone,” the policy reads.

“Every classroom has a phone in our schools,” Altemeyer said. “So, if there’s a family emergency or something comes up and they need to reach their child, they can.”

Most students, though still learning to adapt, have responded positively to the new policy, some even saying it’s been freeing to not have a phone constantly vying for their attention, Altemeyer said.

“They rolled their eyes at first, but it’s really made them think about their own technology use,” she said. “And the word addiction was used, the word toxic was used, but having there be a law behind it alleviates some of that pressure to be, you know, in the know all the time.”

A separate study from the Pew Research Center reported that nearly half of the 1,453 teens (ages 13 to 17) surveyed said they use the internet “almost constantly.”

This is nearly double the 24% of respondents who said the same thing in a 2014-2015 survey by the center.

And while social media plays a large role in students’ phone use, some students in Lawrence Township expressed hesitation because they use their phones to listen to music.

Teachers, however, can adapt, Altemeyer said, with some choosing to play music aloud during independent work time instead.

Policy in Fort Wayne

Fort Wayne Community Schools is taking a slightly different approach to the new cellphone policy.

The Yondr pouch, a technology out of San Francisco, is keeping student cellphones tucked away here at the Fort Wayne district.

The technology is straightforward: a student places their cellphone in a designated, personal-use pouch where it stays locked up until they have access to an “unlocking base.”

Middle schoolers in the district leave their pouches in their homeroom classes at the end of the day, while high schoolers are responsible for them 24/7.

This approach, as well as the implementation of the technology in general, follows a pilot program the district completed last school year.

Prior to finding and using Yondr, FWCS Superintendent Mark Daniel said the cell phone distraction was getting out of hand.

“It seemed as if no matter what we tried to do, it did not seem to be successful,” Daniel said.

Daniel said teachers were constantly having to remind students to put their phones away and noticed students weren’t engaged when phones were present.

As teachers grew frustrated with the situation, administrators brainstormed ways to stave off the growing issue.

“We were looking for a system that could handle this uniformly,” he said.

With the help of chief systems officer Jack Byrd, the pilot program and eventual permanent use of Yondr got underway.

Now, Daniel said, student learning is in a much better place than it was before.

Since using the pouches, Daniel said, the district has seen a 3.36% increase in GPA district wide.

And it isn’t just student learning FWCS administrators want to support, but also kids’ emotions and attitudes in and out of the classroom.

“We like to say we’re helping kids develop their executive functioning,” he said, adding that by taking cellphones out of the learning environment, kids can self-regulate better when facing challenging situations. •