Newsom is urging schools to restrict cell phones in class. Many campuses in the Bay Area are already doing so
Which schools in the Bay Area are already blocking phones?
The San Mateo-Foster City School District will require middle school students to put their phones in lockable bags called Yondr bags starting in the 2022-2023 school year. According to Yondr’s website, the bag can be opened outside of the “phone-free area.”
Without the distraction of news and social media notifications, students are talking to each other more and paying attention in class, said district spokesman Diego Perez.
“As a teacher, you see students looking in their backpacks… They’re looking up, down, up, down — looking for a way to respond to the text message,” he said. “Because of the pockets where the phones go and stay in the backpack, we don’t see that anymore.”
In the San Mateo Union High School District, San Mateo High School and Peninsula High School have been using the same technology. Spokeswoman Laura Chalkley said the district’s board of directors has “expressed interest in expanding the Yondr program, but there has not been a formal discussion.”
In the East Bay, the Mt. Diablo Unified School District is rolling out Yondr to two campuses. In April, the district’s board approved the purchase of more than 3,000 bags for Mt. Diablo and Ygnacio Valley high schools.
The Tamalpais Union High School District is also considering the bags. At a board meeting last week, district officials presented Yondr after piloting an “enhanced cell phone policy during the spring semester of last year that requires all teachers to collect their cell phones at the beginning of each class period,” according to the agenda.
A San Francisco Unified spokesperson said Tuesday that while cell phones must be turned off and put away during classes and recess, “students are permitted to have mobile communications devices on campus as long as they use the devices in accordance with laws, school policies and any regulations of the individual schools.”
Could a nationwide ban be imminent?
There are currently no mandatory cellphone restrictions in the state that impact campuses, but in June Newsom said in a statement that he looked forward to “working with lawmakers to limit smartphone use during the school day,” building on a law he signed in 2019 that allowed districts to regulate cellphone use.
