EDITORIAL | “Nomophobia”: Teachers Weigh in on BC’s New Phone Restrictions
Photo Credit: Getty Images via Vancouver Sun
On Jan. 26, Premier David Eby announced a “bell-to-bell” ban on phones in schools, citing “online dangers” and unsupervised content consumption. Associated NDP members discussed the importance of removing distractions from a classroom environment. More broadly, Eby’s announcement included three actions to ensure youth safety online: “restricting the use of cellphones in schools; launching services to remove images from the internet and pursue predators; and legislation to hold social media companies accountable for the harm they have caused.”
Quebec has had a similar approach towards cell phone usage in schools since January, in which the decisions regarding how to administer the ban were made by individual school boards. Ontario has also had a cellphone ban since 2019, but it has not always been enforced, with teacher unions claiming that cellphones often still appear in class.
The restrictions will be put into place at the district level, according to Eby, and will be designed in collaboration with teachers. The Editorial Board surveyed a few Hamber teachers for their views on the new restrictions, which will ostensibly be taken into account by the VSB when they develop their new district-wide policy.
“I think a lot of it will depend on how it’s implemented,” Mr. M. Lam (Science) said. “Personally, I have the students use their devices quite frequently because a lot of my resources are online.” Lam said that “there can’t be a complete ban [...] teachers should have the choice to decide how it works best for their class.”
“As usual, when the government comes out with these canvas edicts, […] each district is going to have to come up with their own policy, and I don’t have a lot of faith in the VSB to come up with a policy that’s consistent,” Mr. D. Mugford (English) said. “As with so many things, they’ll probably just dump it on the individual teachers or individual schools.”
Mr. Mugford’s current approach is essentially that “we don’t need the phones in the classroom unless we need the phones in the classroom.” He believes that rather than restricting phones district-wide, teachers and students should reach an agreement collectively. “It’s always better to get kids to buy into it rather than doing the top-down method,” he explained.
“Are we asking teachers to ‘raise’ children or give them values? That’s part of our job, but I think that some of that stuff is done in the home.” said Mr. Mugford, who expressed further concern that “teachers will be asked to police it, and that’s not a role that I would want to put myself in.”
Mr. R. Arkiletian (Computer Science) also raised questions as to how the restrictions would be enforced. “There’s no way they’re going to be able to police whether or not your phone is in your bag [...] we can’t have police officers opening your bags up to check,” he said. Like Mr. Mugford, he worried about the restrictions becoming the responsibility of the teacher to enforce. “That can be challenging,” he said, because teachers end up doing so “instead of focusing on teaching.”
Mr. Arkiletian also said that in his experience, “most students aren’t going to have mental health issues because they’re not going to be able to use their phones for a few hours,” though some students “might find that they have a little bit of anxiety.”
Ms. T. Seeliger (Fine Arts) had mixed feelings over the new ban. “There’s a part of me that’s really in agreement with it. I think the phone is an incredible tool […] but we’re enslaved to it just as much as we are using it as a tool.”
In terms of a solution, Ms. Seeliger thinks that “there might be a grey area that we could develop” between the current lack of policy and a bell-to-bell restriction. She suggested potentially disabling certain features such as social media via an app on students’ phones while at school, rather than prohibiting phones altogether.
To Ms. Seeliger, the greatest issues that phone use creates are not academic but social. “Everyone can use their phone if they’re feeling shy to just not deal with whatever is challenging them socially, and I think that’s a huge problem,” she said. “Connection to people is one of the most important indicators of happiness and a fulfilling life, so that’s the thing that I worry about the most.”
The Editorial Board calls upon the VSB to fulfill its promise of consultation with teachers and develop a policy that incorporates their wishes. Only through consideration of teachers’ varied perspectives can the district create an enforceable, effective, and long-lasting phone use policy in schools. The Board also hopes that the VSB will keep in mind the difference in age between students in elementary and secondary schools, which should have a significant impact on any final restrictions. Lastly, this policy should in no situation become an added burden to the already considerable workload of Vancouver teachers, many of whom have no desire to spend their valuable time enforcing new phone policies.