LOS ANGELES, Cali. (DDN) – The Los Angeles Unified School District implemented a ban on smartphone use among pupils on Tuesday.
In June, the nation’s second-largest school district voted 5-2 to ban the use of cellphones, smartwatches, AirPods, and headphones during school hours. Students are instructed to keep their phones turned off and stored in bags or backpacks.
Exceptions are permitted for medical reasons, pupils with disabilities, and emergencies.
“If you use it, you lose it, with confiscated devices picked up only by a parent or legal guardian in the Dean’s Office,” Palms Middle School announced on its website Friday. The school highlighted that the district’s prohibition matched one that was already in effect on campus.
Excessive cellphone use, according to critics, disrupts learning and impairs social interaction.
“Cellphone use in schools has gotten out of control,” said Jackie Goldberg, head of the LAUSD board, in a statement announcing the prohibition. “It’s gotten to the point that students don’t talk face to face, but instead text one another when they’re sitting right next to each other!”
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Tanya Ortiz Franklin, a board member, said it’s heartbreaking to see youngsters sitting alone at lunchtime, on their phones rather than chatting to one another.
LAUSD followed other California school districts in implementing policies even before the legislature mandated them for all of the state’s public K-12 schools in a measure approved last year.
Governor Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 3216, the Phone-Free School Act, in September, requiring every school district, charter school, and county office of education in California to create cellphone limit rules by July 1, 2026. Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi, D-Torrance, one of the bill’s authors, stated that research indicates that smartphone use contributes to cyberbullying, depression, and teen anxiety.
According to a Pew Research study, 72% of high school teachers and 33% of middle school teachers see cellphone distractions as a big issue.
The Phone-Free School Act makes exceptions to cellphone restrictions for medical reasons and emergencies.
Reference: Cellphone ban begins in Los Angeles Unified School District
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