Banning brick phones on journeys from school

[Gridloch]

Are they seriously considering banning brick phones so children can’t be contacted before/after school? How is that sledgehammer to crack a nut rational or defensible?

https://www.scotsman.com/education/parents-allow-brick-phones-in-school-or-campus-ban-will-fail-8943319

There were no costs to you. Your benefit/ cost calculation is different to mine.

There are larger societal costs to allowing phones in schools.

The school isn't just thinking of your child, it's thinking overall.

Schools can't police phones in bags / which are smart / brick. So they make this choice.

I don't have a problem with schools banning smart phones but again it means buses need to put travel cards on a physical smart card (like the London Oyster Zip cards) rather than an app and no homework or school messages should be on an app.
Until that us done then some students will require a smartphone.

How has it changed?

But there used to be public phones all over the place including the "middle of nowhere".
That's my point. Society needs public phones available if we are going to cut down on mobile phone use.

The email doesn’t mention sixth form at all on that update. Just a line of along side using phone pouches, meta glasses and smart watches are not allowed.

Sixth form don’t use the pouches so your guess is as good as mine.

Yes but you've not lived through this phase yet is my point. So your theoretical cost/benefit analysis may be flawed.

But I hope your kids do well whatever you choose.

I grew up in the countryside. I had a mobile phone.

I used to have to walk across the fields in the dark in winter. Sometimes the bus didn't take the right route and I got dropped off somewhere different and had to take a different route. Or if the bus didn't turn up I either had to ring a parent to pick me up and take me, or I had to walk 4.5 miles with no pavements on 60 mile an hour roads, or walk 3.5 miles cross country.

And that was before I was at sixth form, which required an 8 mile walk to school if the bus didn't turn up.

So let's go through that:

1. Wait for the bus.
2. Bus doesn't turn up.
3. Either ring parents and a) ask them to drive you or if they can't b) at least they know which route you're going to take to school and can let them know when you've got to the village the school is in. Or you could also text your friend and check if the bus has turned up for them. Or both. Or if you have no phone, you just have to make a decision and set off on foot, or give up and not go to school. I wasn't within half a mile of my house in either case so if I had gone home, and then the bus had come past, I would have missed it that way as well.
4. Okay, so you've set off with no phone. Now your options while you're out include (all things that have really happened to me, while a teenager in the countryside, admittedly not all on my way to school): a) ankle sprain b) discovering a car crashed in a ditch c) discovering a loose horse.

All of which is much safer and easier to deal with with a mobile phone.

And that's without things like the fact that I sometimes used to stay late after school and my dad would pick me up. Reception staff had left at 4 when the buses went. Dad was a police officer so sometimes he'd be much later leaving work than planned. Having a mobile meant he could ring me when he set off so I would know what time he would arrive, rather than having to go and hang round outside waiting for him.

Edit: other incidents I'm remembering as a teenager include loose sheep, another 2-3 car crashes where I was first on the scene, flooded roads that meant the buses were diverted and were late or entirely cancelled. If on the way to school the bus company would call your parents but that was no use to me if I was on my own several fields away. If on the way back from school the school would allow you to use their phone.

I mean seriously? That's like a whole section in the bookshop.

Have you not been alive very long?

Because pouches are as useful as a chocolate fireguard.

How long before the pouches are filled with all sorts of rubbish, old phone case filled with sand to give it weight, 'Sir there's my phone 📱 in the pouch' ?

I actually cannot believe so many adults are nieve enough to think kids will actually lock their phones away.

Can't imagine teachers being ok with them at any stage (nor should they be) due to the lesson recording implications even aside from any worse behaviour.

Because just saying don’t take them isn’t going to work either.

The same kids who will trick the system will do be it a ban, a pouch or a locker.

Those that genuinely just need/want a phone outside of school will use the locker or pouch.

It’s stupid to think the ban will actually work.

It's not about me, or you.

I've made a calculation and found my stance. You've made a calculation and found yours.

The school has much more data and much more knowledge than both of us on costs and benefits. And they've made this choice.

Don't you think they might be in a better position than you or I, with our 1-4 kids, to weigh up costs / benefits?

Yup me too. I’m 47. No phone until I was 19, I didn’t have a sat nav until I was about 30 and had an Iphone.

IT WAS SHIT!

I don’t think it taught me any skills. Remember arranging to meet someone and then having to hang about for hours or just go home not knowing what happened if they were delayed? What a load of bollocks that was for a start.

And maps, Jesus, trying to drive across the country, stopping to look at a map. Fuck map reading skills, I much prefer sticking my phone on my dashboard and having no stress.

I don’t look back on anything with rose tinted glasses. Everything is easier now and no, I don’t see that as a problem. I remember how crap life was before. I love technology and I think it’s wonderful that my children have it.

You twat about with pay phones and memory maps if you like, no skin off my nose, but that’s not for me, or my children.

P.s before anyone accuses me of being angry, I’m laughing as I type. Man, people must have been like this about the fucking lightbulb. Technology marches on.

Everything feels easier and we are dumbing ourselves down

we have already lost as a society our physical strength - if you look at old walking books people walked further and faster carrying heavier gear than anyone can today. Our bones are substantially weaker. Our jaws are weaker because we eat soft food - burgers and modified chicken over tough steaks most of the time. We have degraded as a species and we are now degrading our minds and this has become measurable. Making things easier isn’t always a great idea.

and the damage especially in children when their brains are developing…

I suspect in future decades , making things easy for kids with tech will be seen as bad as over feeding kids with junk food

We aren’t talking about tech though, it’s a dumb phone the same as I had back in the 90s that can make calls or send texts just not in a phone box

it didn’t make me less resilient as a teenager, it just meant I could make a call like “dad I think there’s a weirdo in the lane, I’m going to wait elsewhere” or ringing 999 for the fire brigade for a drowning donkey or ringing to say I had broken my ankle and needed a lift. All happened after school before going home. Nobody else about on all occasions

They aren’t really though. If you speak to most secondary school teachers, especially those involved with behaviour, they will tell you it’s an absolute shit-show and a huge proportion of their time is spent dealing with issues around phones/ social media etc. And parents aghast that the school has dared to take their kids’ phone off them, coming up with absolutely ridiculous reasons why their child is the exception and threatening to call the police. Meanwhile, surprise surprise, their child starts school refusing or cites mental health problems because they’ve been online for 15 hours a day since the age of 8.

Plus what people seem to forget is that these rules aren’t changing anything you want to do with your kids at home. If you want them to access inappropriate material, spend 15 hours on TikTok or you tube and play grand Theft auto at the age of 8 then that’s up to you. Unless it’s a criminal offence no one will stop you. All schools are trying to do is to create space to educate the kids and get them to learn something without all this nonsense going on.

Ok so a couple of random googles later it seems child abduction is increasing? While a smartphone might not necessarily prevent this my child's phone is tracked the least it will do is provide a last known location and time and if its in his bag and still on him, it will take you right to him

Also to add i can lock my sons phone to be inactive during school hours so it is a brick you can override it to call 999 but thats it no film no google no pics nothing just a paperweight

They won't return because nobody would use them. You can't expect BT to maintain thousands of public phones because schools have decided to ban mobile phones.

Maybe mobile phone companies could create some.
Perhaps they could use either cash or debit card or a smart card which is connected to your family phone contract.
That way they aren't losing customers.

Because for a large school the costs run into five figures which could be much better spent on other things.

And yes, they could ask parents to fund them, but if they can't or won't, the system doesn't work so a blanket ban on smart phones/devices is fairer and easier to manage.

How many of those abductions and attempting abduction, that have caused an uptick in the statistics, are a direct result of unmonitored social media use my children, on SMARTPHONES?!

Banning brick phones won't change any of this.

It won't change the difficult behaviour of the minority and will further alienate otherwise supportive parents within the majority.

The consultation has been badly drawn. It's a policy error.

No, a school does not necessarily know better than the leading campaign group and will not be assessing costs and benefits from an unbiased perspective.
Schools enact a number of policies that are flawed.
That's the nature of institutions - leaders get some things right and some things wrong, they get challenged from outside, things shift slightly - it's a permanent tussle.
Schools are not always right, any more than any other institution.
Doesn't mean I'm not broadly supportive of them.

How many of those are parental or family abductions though?