[chrisamiller]

Our middle school has banned phones during school hours, and it's been great. Even though most kids own phones and have them in their backpacks, they aren't seen. There are less problems during classes and kids have to talk to each other during lunch instead of going head down in their phones. Parental pushback has been really minimal - most parents love it, and it's good for the kids.

Making no phones a blanket policy in all schools should be an absolute no-brainer.

[sweeter]

it's all good until that thing that happens at American schools, happens... That is my one hang up here. It would be idealistic to believe that the Police would protect kids, but in reality there are far too many cases of them being grossly negligent in this exact circumstance... in many of those cases, having a phone played a pivotal role in security. I don't want to get too far into details on HN for the sake of keeping things civil, but I hope you catch my drift.

Im sure there is some happy medium solution here, like putting your phone in a basket or cubby or something like that, at the very least. But I think this is something that has to be seriously addressed and considered. Phones are obviously bad for all of us, more so for children whose minds are far more elastic and far more prone to social alienation. The endless stream of notifications is almost at a gambling / casino level. I think you have to address the root cause of that as well

[nytesky]

Between teachers phones, intercoms, cameras, and hardline phones there should be plenty of communication equipment available for a crisis. If anything having a phone could put someone in jeopardy by making noise and giving away position or distracting owner. What is the scenario that it has helped? Have police coordinated response based upon students phoned in reports and telemetry?

[JumpCrisscross]

> in many of those cases, having a phone played a pivotal role in security

Do you have an example?

Every case I recall involved kids calling their parents who only got mentioned because they got in first responders’ way.

[tyre]

most kids will likely still carry a phone, likely on their person, and try to sneak occasionally. Others will have their phone in their backpack.

And teachers will still carry phones, which they can hand to any kid during an incident if they need to focus on corralling students.

This decentralization is imo more resilient to a school shooter scenario than a centralized cubby system.

[ushtaritk421]

Dumb phone turned off and in backpack would serve fine for this scenario.

[rc5150]

In what world does a kid having a cellphone during an active shooting equal more security?

I’ll wait for specific sources, but that just doesn’t make any sense.

[sebastiennight]

I'm curious. How did the phones save kids in the last 30+ school incidents in the US this year? Could you share a source on that?

[moritonal]

Or live in a country where the last school shooting was more than 25 years ago?

Seriously this is such a weird comment. You don't want to say "school shooting" at risk of being uncivil but you think kids should always be prepared for a live gunman to walk into their lives. From my perspective, that's the uncivil part of your comment.

[vsuperpower2021]

More realistically the phone would be good for calling for advice after you get molested by a teacher. a million times more likely than getting shot. If it's so bad, why not just homeschool?

[martin_a]

[flagged]