More than 10,000 people have signed a new petition opposing a new Clark County school policy that will limit middle and high school students’ access to their phones.
As of Monday afternoon, the petition launched Friday by incoming high school students Charlize Leary and Sean Driscoll has received signatures from students and supporters concerned about students' access to phones in emergency situations. Other parents also brought up excessive disciplinary actions for students who forget their badges as part of another new policy requiring ID badges.
The Clark County School District began rolling out the new phone policy along with signal-blocking, Velcro pouches at 10 percent of middle and high school during the 2023-24 academic year. It’s expanding this policy and equipment to all secondary schools when classes resume Aug. 12.
The district said earlier this year that it had ordered nearly 283,000 pouches for the upcoming school year, each costing $9, for an approximate total of $2.6 million. The purchase was made using federal COVID-19 relief funds.
“The number one main purpose is to ensure a distraction-free learning environment for kids,” said Kevin McPartlin, associate superintendent of CCSD’s education services division during a Monday virtual press conference.
Though the policy won’t directly affect Leary, who’s attending Nevada Learning Academy this upcoming school year, she said in an interview that she wanted to raise awareness of the voices of CCSD students who oppose the policy. Though she agrees with reducing classroom distractions, she said blocking the phones’ signal goes too far.
“I think that we need to have that availability to parents, especially in a crisis,” she said.
She suggested alternatives such as having students place their phone in containers that don’t block out their signal and that students can easily access in case of an emergency.
Driscoll, who will be attending Las Vegas Academy of the Arts starting this August, said as a student with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, he uses his cellphone to listen to music to block out classroom chatter.
“Since I've been able to listen to music, it's helped me tremendously because I don't hear these people,” he said. “I focus on the assignment.”
Driscoll said rather than buying phone pouches, the district should instead invest in better quality food for students and teacher pay.
Members of a popular Facebook group for CCSD Parents have mixed feelings on the policy. Some members agree that the pouches will cut down on classroom distraction, and support the badges for safety reasons.
But other parents say it can be difficult to get a message to their children through schools’ front offices or a teacher. Some petition supporters brought up the need to have access to phones during a crisis — citing the on-campus UNLV shooting last December.
McPartlin said the district isn’t surprised by opposition to the phone policy, but has tried to meet concerned families in the middle by not implementing a wide sweeping cellphone ban.
The district has said students will be able to access their phones in between classes, at lunchtime and during emergencies, which McPartlin said can include a school lockdown or other case by case situations.
“We want to be good partners, and so that's why this is kind of a good compromise for that,” he said.
The petition also touches on another new district policy that will require sixth-12th graders to wear an ID badge while on campus.
Rebecca Dirks Garcia — a parent and administrator of the CCSD Parents Facebook group — said at one of her kids’ schools, officials keep a student in the front office until the child can pay $5 to get a new badge or a parent can give them their badge if they forgot it at home. Administrators have also threatened to give a student detention the first time they don’t bring their ID “to reinforce the importance of having an ID.”
“I get reinforcing behavior with students but making parents miss work to bring an ID or having students miss class time doesn't seem effective if our goal is education and safety alone,” Garcia Dirks said.
During a February event co-hosted by The Nevada Independent and Vegas PBS, parent Stephanie Wells said she pulled her two students out of their middle school after her daughter was suspended for not wearing her badge. She said this made her feel like the school was treating students like inmates.
“When a child is wanting to be educated and you're punishing them for not wearing a badge, what makes that child want to come back and be educated by this person when they're being punished for the simplest thing in the world,” Wells said.
McPartlin said the district is planning to train administrators on the new student code of conduct, which includes progressive disciplinary actions for students who forget their ID badge or refuse to wear them. He said that can start with a phone call to the student’s parent and go all the way to in-school suspension or higher after several offenses.
“This is not meant to be punitive,” he said. “So certainly, a school that would be putting kids out for the first time that would not be aligned with what we're doing. But again, (it’s) not surprising that you may have heard that because we haven't done that training yet for schools.”
McPartlin said how the badges will be enforced can vary such as checking for it when students get to their first period class.
This story was updated on July 23, 2024, at 10:55 a.m. to correct Rebecca Dirks Garcia's last name.
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