Next week, administrators at Harwood Union will hold a community conversation to discuss plans to ban cellphones at the high school when school reopens next August.
That conversation takes place May 29 at the school from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Harwood co-principal Meg McDonough, in an interview this week, explained that she and her peers have investigated pedagogical studies and data and feel strongly that unfettered cellphone usage is distracting, isolating and that it impedes learning but also disconnects people rather than fostering connection and inclusion.
She pointed out that since the advent of smartphones in 2008, there’s an entire generation of students who’ve never known life in an era when people didn’t walk around with small computers/cameras/communication devices/phones in their pockets.
Today’s high school students have seen their parents develop cellphone habits that are less than healthy. They’ve seen family meals disrupted by small islands of cellphone checking rather than a time for coming together to break bread.
All of that is true, and who among us does not use one’s phone to excess?
AND, cellphones have their places and their uses and we have questions about how this will work. Logistically, communications have evolved well past the pre-2008 era. We are accustomed to and depend on a degree of immediacy in terms of communicating with folks (and family members) via text – whether that is wrong or right is not the question here. The question is whether it makes sense to get rid of all the good things that cellphones and instant access provide in an effort to improve student outcomes.
Parents may need to reach students during the day for dentist updates or scheduling information. In the past, they had to call the school office and have that information relayed to the student wherever they were in the building. Parents rely on cellphone apps on their kid’s phone to monitor health. Students use cellphone cameras for school- and sports-related activities.
There is not a single doubt that better cellphone discipline is called for and not just for high school students. But it’s going to have to be balanced in such a way that it meets everyone’s needs.
Let the dialogue begin!
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