Washington Post (Washington, DC) Jun 19, 2010, p. A.

1 Copyright The Washington Post Company Jun 19, 2010. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Turn Off the Cell and Tune In

By Michael Birnbaum That silent, studious classroom? Looks can deceive, say Prince George's County educators, who have fired the latest volley in a technological arms race that pits student against teacher. There is an epidemic of under-the-desk text messages during class, a virtual economy of exam pictures posted to Facebook, a trade in school fight videos on YouTube, they say. To combat it, the county school board voted Thursday to ban cellphones and other electronics during the school day, even as many school systems across the country are loosening their rules. Nor will students be allowed to post photos and videos shot on school property on the Web, which would include such sites as Facebook and YouTube. The ban is the strongest among school systems in the Washington area. "We know for a fact that the use of cellphones on school property around this country has led to a number of problems around safety," said Board of Education Chairman Verjeana M. Jacobs (At Large), citing issues of explicit text messages and videos of fights posted online--one case of which happened just last week at Bowie High School. "It's a tough policy," Jacobs said. She added that the board worked with its attorney to be as strict as legally possible. School systems across the country have had to balance the demands of students and parents, many of whom like being able to stay in contact during the day, with concerns from teachers, who say cellphones' expanding capabilities go hand-in-hand with expanded opportunities for distraction and trouble. Montgomery County last year decided to allow students at many high schools to use cellphones during lunch. New York, by contrast, bars students from even having the devices at school, and it prevailed in a lawsuit by parents challenging the rule.

Prince George's has restricted cellphone use in the past, but the consequences for violations were unclear and unevenly applied, officials said. Under the new policy, students may carry cellphones during the day, but the phones must be turned off and put away, not simply silenced. On rare occasions, officials said, students may get permission from teachers to use the phones. During after-school activities, students will need the permission of a teacher or coach to use cellphones. And photos and videos taken on school property, whether with a cellphone or a camera, may not be shared electronically, ruling out sites such as Facebook, MySpace and YouTube. The policy would not ban parents from posting their students' photographs, Jacobs said. "The intent is not to prohibit fun activities where you can enjoy families and enjoy children in their sports events," Jacobs said. "The intent is to know what's happening and to know what's going on." For example, she said, "at an awards ceremony, I envision that an administrator would give approval to take pictures, and here's an appropriate time to come up front and take pictures. " Students will have their phones confiscated for the day on the first offense. Their parents will have to pick up the phone the second time. After three offenses, students will be forbidden to bring a phone to school for the rest of the year. The rule was passed 7 to 2, with the student board member, Edward Burroughs III, and board member Linda Thornton Thomas (District 4) opposed. Rosalind Johnson (District 1) was not at the meeting. Burroughs, who just graduated from Crossland High School in Temple Hills, called the new rules flawed. "My fear is that this is nothing but a feel-good policy that will make the board feel like it acted on something," he said. Many teachers cheered the decision, but students weren't as happy. Several spoke against the ban at Thursday's meeting. "The policy would not fix any distractions caused by cellphones but rather create new distractions caused by the inefficiencies of this policy," said Richard Lucas, a student at Dr. Henry A. Wise Jr. High School in Upper Marlboro. Another student from Wise said she didn't question the need to crack down during class time. But she argued that cellphones actually can help learning if they are used during free time to access news and information. "At the end of the day, we are in school to learn," Obianuju Okonkwo said. "Why not also extend that time to lunchtime?"

In the District, cellphone use is restricted, but principals have discretion in how to enforce the rules, said schools spokeswoman Jennifer Calloway. In Fairfax County, which nominally has a ban, principals also use their discretion, said schools spokesman Paul Regnier. Phones are off-limits in class, but in a hallway, "a kid says, 'I'm talking to my mother.' The mother's fine with it, the kid's fine with it, so what's the problem here?" he said. Many in Prince George's did see a problem. One teacher said that cellphones and text messaging were a plague in his classroom and that if students want to phone home, they are welcome to use the land line on his desk. "Some of the kids are so hooked on [cellphones] that from the first day of school, they don't even give their class a chance," said Doug Bishop, a social studies teacher at Suitland High School. His complaints prompted school board member Donna Hathaway Beck (At Large) to propose the policy. "Text messaging is going on all the time," he said. When he talked to his class in advance of the ban, he said, some students were defiant, saying that nobody would take their phones away. His top students, however, said their distracted peers distracted them. The ban on posting images to the Web is likely to be the most controversial and hardest to enforce, students said. Officials said they expect enforcement to be done in a measured way. They do not plan to assign someone to patrol Facebook, Jacobs said. But they will enforce the ban if alerted that inappropriate photos or videos have been posted. And there likely won't be disciplinary consequences when a video of a school fight posted online enables officials to catch the perpetrators, as was the case last week, she said. "I think that's where the discretion will come in," she said. "Clearly, in that case, I would be remiss in saying that was not helpful." Beck said the school system's next target concerning the technology is teachers, who can be as guilty as students in their classroom cellphone use. But that will have to come as part of contract negotiations, she said.

birnbaumm@washpost.com

Back to top ^

Citation:
You can copy and paste this information into your own documents. Birnbaum, Michael. "Turn Off the Cell and Tune In." Washington Post (Washington, DC). 19 Jun 2010: A.1. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 12 Oct 2011.

Add to My List Email Print view

Back to Search Results

Vocabulary :

Volley a burst or outpouring of many things at once or in quick succession: a volley of protests.

Explicit described or shown in realistic detail: explicit sexual scenes

prevailed to succeed; become dominant; win out: to wish that the right side might prevail

plague any cause of trouble, annoyance, or vexation: Uninvited guests are a plague. negotiations an instance or the result of negotiating

Antonius howze Lls-02 Summary practice 10/12/11

Citation: You can copy and paste this information into your own documents. Birnbaum, Michael. "Turn Off the Cell and Tune In." Washington Post (Washington, DC). 19 Jun 2010: A.1. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 12 Oct 2011.