The Association of Secondary Teachers of Ireland (ASTI) has called on school management boards to set guidelines on the use of mobile phones in schools. It has recommended that breaches of these guidelines should attract penalties.
ASTI president Mr Pat Cahill
While the ASTI says ordinary mobile phones should never be switched on during class time, it is particularly concerned with the use of picture messaging phones.
The union says it receives many queries from its members about how to deal with situations where pupils are caught using these phones on school grounds.
ASTI has called on parents to warn their children on the misuse of phones.
"Schools and parents have a responsibility to ensure the proper and careful use of such phones," according to the ASTI president, Mr Pat Cahill.
The union recommends guidelines are backed by penalties in accordance with schools' codes of behaviour.
Yesterday in the Dáil, the Minister for Communications, Mr Dermot Ahern rejected calls for the compulsory registration of prepaid mobile phones.
Mr Ahern said legislation was already in place to deal with the problem of sending offensive, obscene, indecent or menacing messages by phone. Opposition deputies had asked Mr Ahern to introduce compulsory registration of prepaid phones so that phones used for criminal or obscene purposes could be traced.
The move follows an incident last month, which sparked a Garda investigation, involving the circulation of an explicit image of a schoolgirl on picture phones.
The sexually-explicit image, which showed the girl in a uniform, was circulated among secondary school students nationwide.
Under the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act 1998, anyone found in the possession of child pornography may face a maximum fine of £5,000 (€6,348) and/or five years' imprisonment.
Anyone convicted for distributing such material, which includes forwarding any of the images, is liable to a fine and/or 14 years' imprisonment.