As students return to school across the Pontiac this week, they will be forced to adapt to what, for some, may feel like a new world order, as they will no longer be allowed to use their cellphone on school grounds or during school hours.
This is because the province’s complete school cellphone ban, first announced in the spring, is now in effect.
The recommendation for a full ban was made by a special government committee that studied the impact of cellphones and social media on the health and development of young people.
It was one in a series of measures from the minister, all designed to “provide students and school teams with a safe, respectful environment where bullying and violence have no place,” according to the press release announcing these changes.
While the policy’s details were at first ambiguous, leaving students, educators and parents apprehensive as to what the ban would actually look like, the Ministry of Education has since provided greater clarity on where cell phones are allowed, and where they are not.
Simply put, students are not allowed to have their devices on them during the school day. Cellphones, if brought to school, need to stay in the student’s locker, and cannot be used during the lunch period.
“Students are allowed to bring them into the school, but they must remain in their locker for the duration of the school day,” reinforced Pontiac High School (PHS) principal Luke McLaren.
“We were quite afraid that they wouldn’t be allowed to have them on the bus. [ . . . ] A number of our students have very long bus rides, and that was an area of concern that we had identified,” he explained, noting he was relieved to learn phones were in fact allowed on school buses.
The Centre de services scolaire des Hauts-Bois-de-l’Outaouais, which runs École secondaire Sieur de Coulonge (ESSC) provided further details as to what the ban would involve in its schools.
Like at PHS, the use of cellphones and electronic devices is prohibited in all schools, students may keep their devices with them, but they must be turned off and stored in a bag or locker as soon as they arrive at school, and use is permitted only for educational purposes.
Exceptions related to special health or learning needs may be authorized by the school administration. On school buses, ESSC students may keep their devices with them, but they must remain turned off and may not be used to film, photograph, or broadcast content under any circumstances.
Joel Westheimer, a professor of education at the University of Ottawa, said while he is usually against top-down education policies, he supports this ban.
“The devices are too addictive, damaging to mental health, [and] academic achievement,” he said. “Top-down policies also give teachers cover rather than making them be the ‘bad guy’. There is also an epidemic of loneliness and cellphone and social media use has been shown to be implicated.”
Implementation questions
While supportive of the ban, Westheimer said thoughtfulness in how it is applied is still critical.
“Don’t make the ban punitive. It shouldn’t be the equivalent of metal detectors at the front door,” he said.
“Ideally, schools would hold community discussions on the bans and talk with students about what kind of community they want the school to be. [ . . . ] Talk about friendships and loneliness. Admit how addicted adults are too! It’s a broad society-wide problem.”
He also warned against implementing policy without introducing other reforms that would help build relationships between teachers and students and build friendships between students.
“It’s important to not ignore the role of social media in social connection – schools have to replace that with something.”
McLaren acknowledged the need for the school to offer alternative modes of connection for students during the lunch hour.
“The key for us is I think we really have to look at unstructured time, to make sure we have robust activities as an alternative to cellphones.”
He said while he appreciated the policy is clearer, and is in fact more or less aligned with a cellphone policy PHS’s own governing board had adopted in May of this year, there is still work to be done on how exactly the ban will be implemented.
“I do have some questions in my mind in terms of implementation,” he said. “So I’m going to be working with teachers, students, and the governing board, to come up with a plan for that. But as we do with every policy, I hope a plan would be in place where education would be the first and foremost on our minds, so if a student wasn’t complying, a conversation would hopefully be the place where a teacher, or me as a principal would start.”
