What is your secondary school doing about mobile phone policy?

[Monitored]

Our school are suggesting trackers as phones aren’t allowed on site or the commute either. This also includes brick phones. Crackers. How do I support the logic of this to my child?

I think this is great. I think the no brick phone policy is unnecessary though. But in general I support the attempt to normalise the idea that kids don’t need phones.

I don’t support trackers either, I don’t think it’s good for kids development or MH. Ultimately we are saying ‘the world is a scary place that you can’t manage alone’ by giving one. I think we either prepare them for independence and trust them at the right time, or we don’t let them do the things we feel they are not yet ready for. I’d rather communicate the sentiment ‘There is a beautiful big world out there to discover, go and experience all the things we have practiced together, on your own now, because you are ready’.

I don’t support trackers either, I don’t think it’s good for kids development or MH. Ultimately we are saying ‘the world is a scary place that you can’t manage alone’ by giving one.

Totally agree with this and we don't use a tracker. But I do support secondary school pupils being able to use public transport to further promote independence. And in this area, the best value bus season ticket is only available on the bus company's app. Which is ridiculous from the bus company but here we are.

Surely parents want to support the school and wouldn’t allow their child to do this? If children at my school do this they get a suspension

No smartphones allowed on site at all at our school. Children can bring a brick phone in and have been issued with physical bus passes.

This thread is just proving why kids are so useless it's you parents that do it to them 😂 god forbid your kid goes for a walk without a phone however will the little darlings cope! 😂😂😂 There's a reason they teach something called resilience 😊

Yes our local bus company reintroduced physical passes last year after being mobile only for a time.

It's much better we've found. You still have the app version if you want but my DS mostly uses the physical version and saves worries about low battery etc. Good not to have everything tied to the phone.

I wouldn't be happy about no phones on the commute. My DS school has a phones away all day policy which is enforced.

We started with a brick phone and used an air tag for tracking, which worked well to start. We switched to a smartphone as he got older, which was locked.down..
Still retained tags in school and sports baga, useful for tracking them when they get left on the bus.

Let’s spell it out: if a brickphone is all you need, you don’t need a phone at all.
In many situations, a smartphone is an absolute must - count yourself lucky if your child doesn’t need one.
Rural - no mobile phone reception in many places. Usually wifi on train and bus.
Train and bus usually run in massive issues (multi hour delay) at least once per month. If you are happy with your teenager being stuck at a tiny train station with no shelter (or at a random bus stop with nothing close) for 2-3 hours in the dark - great for you. I’m not, and thankfully school isn’t either.
A smartphone means a) they know where they are , b) can use wifi on bus/train to notify me, and figure out another way home, c) have a torch in case they do need to walk on country lanes.
We aren’t in the 80s anymore- bus snd train are not reliable, there are no payphones, and hitchhiking home isn’t recommended either.

Many of the kids at the school I work at take trains and buses, in the dark in winter after activities and sports practice. I wouldn’t do that without a phone and would not expect a minor to.

They have to be out of sight during the day. If seen they go to the school office and a parent has to collect + detention.

"On the commute" includes walking to school with friends and likely wearing school uniform. All bad behaviour while wearing school uniform when I was pupil was considered a school issue and disciplinable by school. The walking commute with friends is a prime opportunity for bullying too. No phones seems totally legit to me.

Team school, here.

In Australia too, rules are very similar to UK, have to be handed in or switched off in bags depending on school but you are allowed one on the commute. It would be downright dangerous otherwise, there are very few public phones and travel on public transport for a lot of kids to get to school. People need to remember that we may not have had mobile phones growing up but we did have an extensive network of public phones back then.

Our school is very strict. Keeps them for six weeks. If that goes over the holidays they keep them for the holidays too. Bit much I think really.

DD’s school is the same and it’s been fine. She does have an AirTag in her bag so I can check where she is if she’s not home by her normal time. Yes, I’d feel more comfortable with her having a phone of some sort on the commute, but we’ve made it through the year ok.

i think even just allowing them ”off and out of sight” is a slippery slope so I understand why the school have done it this way.

Mine has never allowed mobile phones, the school phones us whenever my AuDHD teen needs to come home etc

Previous generations had the option of a payphone to tell their parents that the bus or train had not turned up.

We only have one bus an hour - without a phone, DS cannot check whether it has been cancelled or whether it is merely delayed. He cannot tell us that he will be late home, or to his after school activities. So if he doesn't come home, we will need to do a 22 mile round trip to see if he is still waiting for the bus or something else has happened.

Luckily he only has one year left in secondary school and these rules do not apply to sixth forms.

We have had the yonder pouches for about 2 years now and seems to work. Yes they can open them but they don't really as get in trouble. They have ipads so they use those to email/take pics etc if needed.

I'm a child of the 80's so mobile phones didn't exist really so we all managed fine commuting to school without them! But I do appreciate that we had lots of payphones so we could call home if needed to. It is a bit more tricky now. Best idea surely is handing phones in to tutor on arrival and collection at end of something similar.

My son’s school has always had a blanket ban on any mobile phone use at school which we have supported. His phone had to be switched off and at the bottom of his bag from before he walked through the gates in the morning (they all shake hands with the headmaster at the gates on entry to the school every morning). This was fine until a troublesome few kept sneaking looks at their phones during the day, and so then 2 years ago they brought in Yondr pouches which are expensive and break very easily with no replacement parts available. Plus the few naughty boys just use a burner phone to put into their yondr pouches in front of the form tutor each morning and still have their real phones in their blazer pocket 🙄

I wholeheartedly agree with no mobile phones at school, but Yondr Pouches are not the answer due to the poor quality!

Same here - rural school with a huge catchment and many kids are travelling over an hour by school bus/public bus/train (often a combination of train and bus). Kids currently use the Stagecoach app to check bus status - obviously no longer an option. Also no option to phone home and say bus was cancelled, please pick me up/I'll walk into town and get the train/I'll wait for the next one.

DH is a governor. Once they introduced a policy of parents have to collect the phone, the number of violations dropped a lot.

I don't know whether they are introducing pouches.

Airtags only work if there is someone else with an iphone who has opted in to location sharing nearby. They are useless outside of areas with lots of people.

"On the commute" also involves buses and trains. Try finding out whether your bus is delayed or cancelled without a smartphone. Would you be happy doing a 1 hour+ commute to work, in the dark of winter, with no way of checking whether your transport was delayed, cancelled, or otherwise, and with no way of communicating with your family? But it's fine for a 14 year old?

True, it’s not perfect, but since she takes the bus home there’s usually enough people around that I can see a fairly recent location for her. As in, I can tell if she’s on the bus, which is usually sufficient.

Exactly. Common sense has to prevail.
The vast majority of the kids are great. You never see them on their phones and they just carry them for safety/listening to music for their journeys home. Which I do to!

Pouches are being introduced next term.

Im glad they have their phones for the commute though. It gives DS the freedom to call and ask to go to his friends, or to the park without having to come home first and tell me.

Also I can see where he is and ask him to go & collect his little brother if I'm running late 😂

Our school are also doing lockers. Makes sense. My son regularly goes to the gym after sch with friends and needs his phone for bus pass, gym pass and so I can track location. But no need for him to have at school all day.