Why cellphone crackdowns in metro Atlanta classrooms may not be easy

Marietta City Schools Superintendent Grant Rivera talked to the district’s middle school students about the plans to restrict cellphone use by them this year.

The students, he recalled somewhat jokingly, already had plans to circumvent the new rules.

“They said, ‘Here’s what we’re gonna do to beat you,’” Rivera said. “Right now, we feel like we’re winning, but we haven’t started school yet.”

Credit: Ben Hendren

Rivera and educators in a couple of dozen schools across metro Atlanta will soon be confronted with ways to win this school year.

This summer, a handful of districts and some principals decided to ban the use of cellphones by students in middle school, high school and a couple of elementary classrooms. The decision came after educators said students were being easily distracted and spending an ample amount of instruction time texting or using social media. The new school year begins Tuesday in some districts. Classes start Thursday in Marietta.

For some schools implementing this change, such as Marietta City Schools, and Midtown High School in Atlanta, students will have to place their phones or other small personal devices, such as smartwatches, in pouches that will be locked throughout the day. The pouches can only be unlocked with the help of a teacher or other authorized administrator.

In DeKalb County, some schools are following suit with the pouches, but another handful of schools will try a cellphone locker instead. In Cherokee County, students will now be expected to keep their device in silent mode and stored out of sight.

Decatur High School students will place their phones in a designated lockable cellphone holder at the start of each class period every day. Students with accommodations requiring the use of a cellphone will be exempt from the protocol.

Educators are hoping the stricter policies will lead to fewer distractions and more student engagement during class time. Rivera said the new policy will help reach these goals.

“Candidly, I want kids to interact with one another, and I think that could happen as naturally without cellphones today as it happened in a cafeteria 20 years ago,” Rivera said in an interview. “I want our kids to learn how to shake someone’s hand. I want our kids to learn how to engage in a conversation.”

Implementing the changes, as Rivera noted during last month’s meeting, will not be easy. In addition to students looking for ways to work around the new rules, some students used their phones and other devices to create videos or other purposes for schoolwork.

Dave Anderson, a clinical psychologist with the Child Mind Institute, thinks limiting cellphone use in classrooms is a good idea, but warns it will definitely come with challenges that districts may not be fully prepared for.

“You try to anticipate every way they can break the rules, but they’re usually more inventive than the adults who are trying to oversee the rule,” Anderson said.

Anderson had some ideas about how students will get around the new policy.

“Teenagers are champions of deciding that rules are, you know, overly strict or shouldn’t necessarily apply,” Anderson said. “Kids are gonna put dead cellphones in the pouches and then carry their actual cellphone with them,” he said.

“Kids are gonna decide on a collective device that they all will use, and not turn in,” he continued.

Lashanda Nelson, a teacher at Briarlake Elementary School in DeKalb County, said cellphones are sometimes even a problem with younger students, primarily in fourth or fifth grade.

“I actually had to tell kids to turn their phones off because the phones would be ringing in class,” Nelson said.

She also said that even though phones will be in pouches or lockers, she hopes parents’ minds will be eased because students will still physically have access to the devices.

“It’s not as if the students won’t have access to their phones, or it’s not as if the phones are being kept away in a secret room or in the office or the media center,” Nelson said. “No, they’re going to be on the kids.”

In Marietta and at Midtown High, students who violate the policy will have their phones taken away after the first offense. In DeKalb, the consequence will depend on the offense, but it could result in confiscation. In Cherokee, disciplinary action includes a 10-day prohibition period.

Some parents have said it was important for their children to have cellphones in case of an emergency as school shootings became more frequent occurrences. As manufacturers developed smartphones, many educators took advantage of the technology, using the devices for classroom exercises.

Brittany Cunningham, principal at Cross Keys High School in DeKalb County, said rather than using cellphones as a part of instruction, she wants the school to use Chromebooks or other district-provided technology.

Midtown High School’s principal, Betsy Bockman, has similar plans. She said Chromebooks are a reliable resource, and that it meets every educational need.

“Every student has a Chromebook and Chromebooks are adequate for every single assignment,” Bockman said. Students do not need cellphones or other personal devices during the school day, she added. If necessary, students can also use their Chromebooks to reach their parents.

But Piper Boatwright, a rising senior at Midtown High, said while the laptops could be a good school resource, it doesn’t substitute for cellphones. Boatwright said even though she’ll be able to communicate with her parents, laptops are not always that accessible.

“It’s not like, I can just whip my computer out and send my parents a quick text message,” Boatwright said. It’s a concern for her if there was an emergency at school, she said.

Credit: contributed

Some educators and students have had issues with Chromebooks. Many have malfunctioned or failed within a handful of years for reasons unrelated to user treatment, ABC News reported last year. They’re also difficult to repair, critics said. Google announced in September 2023 that its Chromebook platforms will get regular automatic updates for 10 years and the company is working on quicker processes to repair them. Some schools in other states have switched to different types of Chromebooks.

In the meantime, the countdown to the new policies is underway.

Rivera said the Marietta district has a plan laid out, but depending on how the first few weeks go, things may have to be adjusted.

Phones will be locked throughout the day, even through lunch, only to be unlocked in students’ last period class.

“In the last five minutes of the day, there will be an announcement that says, ‘Teachers, you may unlock the pouches,’ ” Rivera said.

With a specialized magnet, teachers will then go from student to student, unlocking the pouches one by one.

In DeKalb County, schools are following a similar protocol, but the changes will not be implemented right away. Instead of starting from Day One, the policy will go into effect on Sept. 3. The district will take the month of August to put locking mechanisms in place and to talk with students and parents about the changes.

“We’re going to guide people along the way as we approach that implementation day,” said Darnell Logan, DeKalb’s director of student relations.

In total, 18 schools, including a mix of elementary, middle and high schools, will test the new policy — with 10 schools to test the pouches and eight testing the lockers.

At Midtown High School in Atlanta, Bockman is hoping the new policy will force students to truly interact with one another, rather than relying on the internet.

“Connection doesn’t happen through social media. Connection happens in the school with people face to face,” Bockman said.

Boatwright, the Midtown student, said the new policy is going to be a big change.

“I think for students, it’s going to be a lot harder to adjust to the work style, or into being focused on school all day long,” Boatwright said. “I think it’s gonna be a rough first month.”

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