As students across the country head back to class, one thing won’t be coming with many of them: their cell phones. This year more states than ever are banning students’ devices during school hours.
In Texas, every public and charter school student will be without their phones during the school day this fall. Brigette Whaley, an associate professor of education at West Texas A&M University, expects to see “a more equitable environment” in classrooms with higher student engagement.
Last year, she tracked the success of a cell phone ban in one west Texas high school by surveying teachers throughout the year. They reported more participation by students, and also said they saw student anxiety plummet – mainly because students weren’t afraid of being filmed at any moment and embarrassing themselves.
“They could relax in the classroom and participate,” she said. “And not be so anxious about what other students were doing.”
The findings in west Texas align with results from many of the states and districts that are heading back to school without phones: Students learn better in a phone-free environment. Getting cell phones out of the classroom is a rare issue with significant bipartisan support, allowing a rapid adoption of policies across red and blue states alike.
Some 31 states and the District of Columbia now restrict students’ use of cell phones in schools, according to Education Week.
Not everyone is on board
The rapid adoption of these policies, Whaley says, can sometimes make for uneven enforcement. While most teachers at the school she studied supported the ban, there was one teacher who refused, which caused problems for other teachers.
Alex Stegner, a social studies and geography teacher in Portland, Ore., said his school saw similar results when it adopted a ban during the 2024-25 school year. Their old policy had each teacher at Lincoln High School collect phones at the start of class in a lock box.
He says some teachers left the boxes open, others closed them but did not lock them. And he, along with some of his colleagues, locked the phones up: “I was committed to kind of going all in with it and I liked it.”
He said last school year was the first year in a decade he didn’t spend class time chasing cell phones around the room.
Now, as the cell phone restriction goes statewide this school year, Lincoln enters into its second year with some kind of ban, things are changing a bit.
This year students’ phones will be locked away for the entire day, not just class time.
Stegner thinks it will be a learning curve not just for teachers and students. His school has already been fielding calls from anxious parents worried about not being able to contact their kids throughout the day.
Even so, he expects parents to relax as the school year goes on: “I do think that there seems to be this kind of collective understanding that we’ve got to do something different.”
The cost of going phone-free
Like a lot of schools, Lincoln High School will be distributing individual locked bags, called Yondr pouches, to students this year. The same ones that were used in the district Whaley studied in Texas, and for about 2 million students nationwide.
Stegner worries about transitioning the responsibility of holding on to phones from teachers to students: “I heard stories last year about Yondr pouches that were like … cut open, destroyed.”
The pouches cost about $30 each, so for a school like Lincoln with more than 1,500 students, this year’s policy comes with a high price tag.
Other states have anticipated the high cost and set aside money for districts to make the transition. In Delaware, Rosalie Morales oversees the state’s pilot program for cell phone bans and the $250,000 attached to it. As the program enters its second year, she’s surveyed the schools that participated last year.
“The response from teachers is definitely supportive,” Morales says. “You’ll see a different response from students.”
They’re not wild about it
When asked if the ban should continue, 83% of the participating Delaware teachers said yes, while only 11% of students agreed. Morales hopes that as time passes, that will change as students see the benefits.
Zoë George, a student at Bard High School Early College in New York City, is not quite there yet. For now, she sees her state’s ban as “annoying” especially as she starts her last year of high school.
“I wish that they would hear us out more,” she says.
She’s worried about the implications for homework and school work during free periods, and says often students use their phones to get work done. Her school also typically allows students to leave campus for lunch, but with a bell-to-bell cell phone policy, that gets harder.
“It’s not the worst because it’s my last year,” George says. “But at the same time it’s my last year.”
She’s sad she won’t get to take pictures and videos of her friends throughout the day, it feels like she won’t have memories like she does from her other years of school.
Next year she hopes to be at college and is looking forward to the freedom.
Transcript:
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
More states are banning students from using their phones during school hours. Some individual schools, as well. One of my kids has to zip the phone in a little bag during school hours. NPR’s Sequoia Carrillo has the story.
SEQUOIA CARRILLO, BYLINE: This school year is the first one where every student in Texas public and charter schools will be without their phones during the school day. But Brigette Whaley, an associate professor of education at West Texas A&M University, has a hunch of how things will go.
BRIGETTE WHALEY: A more equitable environment, a more engaging classroom for students.
CARRILLO: She spent the last year surveying the rollout of a cellphone ban in a public high school in West Texas, focusing on how teachers felt about the program. They saw improved engagement and more conversation between students.
WHALEY: They were really happy to see that students were more willing to work with each other.
CARRILLO: Student anxiety also plummeted, according to her research. The primary reason? Students weren’t afraid of being filmed at any moment and embarrassing themselves.
WHALEY: They could relax in the classroom and participate and not be so anxious about what other students were doing.
CARRILLO: The findings in West Texas align with the results from many of the states and districts that are heading back to school without phones. Students learn better in a phone-free environment. It’s been a rare issue with bipartisan support, allowing a rapid adoption of policies across many states. That fast pace, Whaley says, can sometimes be a hazard to the policy’s impact. While most teachers at the school she studied supported the ban…
WHALEY: There was one teacher that didn’t enforce the policy well, and that seemed to cause difficulty for other teachers.
ALEX STEGNER: Every teacher had a little bit different policy on that.
CARRILLO: That’s Alex Stegner, a social studies and geography teacher in Portland, Oregon, talking about his district’s cellphone ban. He says the different types of enforcement were normal at his school. Last year, each teacher at Lincoln High School got a lockbox to collect phones at the start of class.
STEGNER: Some teachers did not lock the boxes. Some teachers left the doors wide open. And some teachers, like me, locked them. I was just committed to kind of going all in with it, and I liked it.
CARRILLO: He said last year was the first year in a decade he didn’t spend class time chasing cellphones around the room. Now, as Lincoln goes into its second year with some kind of ban, things are changing a bit. This year, students’ phones will be locked away for the entire day, not just class time. Stegner thinks it will be a learning curve, but not just for teachers and students.
STEGNER: I think some parents will struggle. But I do think that there seems to be this kind of collective understanding that we got to do something different.
CARRILLO: Like a lot of schools, Lincoln High School will be distributing individual locked bags, known as Yondr pouches, to students this year – the same ones that were used in the district Whaley studied in Texas and for about 2 million students nationwide.
STEGNER: I heard stories last year about Yondr pouches, you know, cut open, destroyed. And there’s a whole, like, logistical thing that comes with giving students these pouches and telling them, like, OK, now that’s your responsibility.
CARRILLO: So teachers seem to like cellphone bans. But as for the kids…
ROSALIE MORALES: You’ll see a different response from students.
CARRILLO: Rosalie Morales is in her second year overseeing Delaware’s pilot program for a statewide cellphone ban. She surveyed teachers and students at the end of the first year to ask if the ban should continue. Eighty-three percent of teachers said yes, while only 11% of students agreed.
ZOE GEORGE: It’s annoying.
CARRILLO: Zoe George, a student at Bard High School Early College in Manhattan, says no one asked her before New York State banned cellphones.
GEORGE: I wish that they would hear us out more.
CARRILLO: She’s worried about the implications for homework and schoolwork during free periods. She says her school doesn’t have enough laptops for every student, so often students would use their phones. But also, it’s just a nuisance.
GEORGE: It’s not the worst because it’s my last year. But at the same time, it’s my last year.
CARRILLO: Next year, she hopes to be at college, and she’s looking forward to the freedom.
Sequoia Carrillo, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “PHONE DOWN”)
ERYKAH BADU: (Singing) I can make you, I can make you, I can make you put your phone down.
INSKEEP: Is there any history of human beings surviving without cellphones? Yes. Yes, there is.
