Parents who need to contact their children while in class will be advised to leave messages through the school office under new guidance on implementing a mobile phone ban across all schools.
The letter, from Minister for Education Norma Foley to school managers, sets out in greater detail how the ban will operate.
It acknowledges that parents may permit their children to carry and access their phones during travel to and from school.
It says there should be no access to devices during the school day and they may be placed in lockers or cubbies. Schools may allow phones to be stored in the students’ bags during the school day, if switched off.
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If parents need to contact their children for family emergencies or medical appointments, they should leave a message with the school office.
School policies should provide for those who need access to their mobile phone for specific reasons, such as students with diabetes who use continuous glucose monitoring with a sensor linked to their mobile phone to monitor blood sugar levels.
It says use of tablets, computers and laptops will still be supported and encouraged, provided they are used “under the direct guidance of a staff member in the context of teaching and learning and in line with the school’s policies”.
The letter says the policy approach is “based on the growing concerns expressed about the impact of the use of mobile phones during the school day, including the potential for distraction during class time, the risk of accessing inappropriate content and cyberbullying, and the potential for decreased social interaction with peers.”
It notes that many schools already have well-developed and managed policies in place in this area currently, and the initiative aims to “build on that foundation”.
However, for other school, the ban provides “a supportive framework to enable them to implement more stringent policies.”
The letter states that the initiative will build on the “keeping childhood smartphone free” policy which is aimed at children in primary school and notes that the policy has also been supported by all of Ireland’s leading mobile phone network operators.
In response, the Irish Second Level Students’ Union (ISSU) said proposals for a blanket phone ban in second-level schools are “not feasible”.
“It means adding another responsibility on the system to police phone usage,” the organisation said, in a statement. “It could also mean schools having to accept responsibility for the safety of up to 1,000 mobile phones each day.”
The ISSU, the representative body for student councils, said mobile phones are often used during the school day for educational reasons, with Junior Cycle classroom-based assessments and Leaving Cert projects in subjects’ requiring use of the internet.
“The Department of Education should focus on expanding the IT support grant to enable schools to purchase more IT facilities for students,” the union added.
The Minister for Education said on Wednesday that her department will take a “collaborative and collective approach” with schools regarding the blanket ban on mobile phones, with the policy to be reviewed at the end of the year.
Ms Foley said how the policy will be implemented in individual schools will fall to the schools themselves and that “different schools will take different approaches”.
“Some [schools] might choose that the phones will remain in their bags for the day and not be used, seen or heard at any point during the school day,” Ms Foley said.
“Others might use lockers or whatever, but the decision ultimately will be made by the school, but it will be made by the school in consultation with everyone. That’s the students within the school, staff, parents … So all voices will be heard in relation to it.
“But I think it’s incontrovertible, really, that students will benefit from having a break for those number of hours from the mobile phone.”
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