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PC Check:
Overall, cellphone use in school negatively affects student grades and overall performance.
Reality Check:
Overall, cellphone use in schools makes students dumber.
This past September, I was invited to bring my Student Success Project presentation, “Succes(s)ession,” to a local high school. They laid out their objectives for the day as they were to embark on their own success initiative for the year.
They asked what my requirements would be. I had one, no cellphones. While trying to make them brighter, self-reliant, motivated, and hopefully a bit happier, I needed them focused. And these days that’s code for no phones.
THE DEADLY TREND CONTINUES
It was shared that this school, like most high schools in America, was struggling with a significant and recent increase in severe mental illness among its students. The primary diagnoses were depression and anxiety disorders, with increasing rates of suicidal thoughts, ideation, and self-harm; girls were particularly vulnerable. A common thread is heavy addiction to cellphone use.
Teachers and administrators I spoke with know this wasn’t merely a coincidence. They saw clear links between rising phone addiction and declining mental health (no kidding), to say nothing of declining academic performance.
PERHAPS A TEACHER KNOWS WHAT’S BEST
A common theme in my conversations with them was that teachers despise cellphones in the classroom even knowing the benefits that tech brings. They felt it just wasn’t worth it. But what do teachers know anyway?
Keeping students off of their devices during class was impossible. They seemed permanently distracted and congenitally distractible. Drama, conflict, bullying and scandal played out continually during the school day on platforms to which the staff had no access. Knowing the absurd answer, I asked a ridiculous question – why couldn’t they ban phones during school hours?
They said too many parents would be upset if they could not reach their children during the school day. Parents know (if not, they shouldn’t be parenting) the addiction and distraction these devices cause in their children, many of whom have harrowing stories of self-harming behavior and suicide attempts among their friends’ children.
Earlier in the year, Palmetto High School graduate and United States Surgeon General Vivek Hallegere Murthy issued a prominent advisory warning that social media can carry “a profound risk of harm to the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents.” But does anyone listen? Nope.
THE UNBILICAL CORD
Many say because of the school shootings, they need to be able to contact their kids. Some have even called it a lifeline. But I can tell you firsthand the only line provided is the direct one allowing parents to contact their kids anytime during the day. It hovers to the ‘nth degree.
Some smart schools and districts have begun to fight back out of professional survival as the true purpose of their calling has taken a backseat anyway. Educators are tired of plummeting test scores and lack of advancement. And it didn’t take analysis, peer review or school board input; it took common sense.
GUARENTEED RESULTS
Nationwide, many schools have gone entirely phone-free during the school day. So, the time is right for parents and educators to ask: Should the school day be phone-free? Would that reduce rates of depression, anxiety, and self-harm? Would it improve educational outcomes? The answer to all these questions is an obvious yes.
Unlimited studies show that, despite school rules, students check their phones a lot during class and receive and send texts if they can get away with it.
Their focus is often and easily derailed by interruptions from their devices, as 97 percent of ALL students in ALL grades said they use their phone during class for noneducational purposes. Nearly 60 percent of students said they spend more than 25 percent of class time on their phones, mostly texting.
JUST THE THOUGHT OF A CELLPHONE
Interestingly, many of these conditions do not involve active phone use––just the potential distraction of knowing your phone is there, with texts and social media posts waiting. The results were precise: The closer the phone was to students’ awareness, the worse they performed on the tests. Even just having a phone in their pocket sapped students’ abilities.
Teachers are tired of looking out at 30 students being distracted by 30 phones as they are undeterred by any authority to pay attention. And if the phones are taken away, you know what happens next as they are all represented by high-powered legal defense teams, Mom and Dad.
We know what needs to be done, yet we ignore the devastating results. And the further down we go in the rabbit hole on this, the darker and more deadly consequences for a generation of students.
So, as cellphone use in the classroom makes students dumber, parents not doing a thing about it makes them the dumbest.
This column is by Ritchie Lucas, Founder/CEO of the non-profit The Student Success Project. He can be reached by email at ritchie@studentsuccessproject.org and on Facebook as The Student Success Project.
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