No patience for cell phones in Hillsborough

Hillsborough is poised to crack down on students abusing cell phones. School officials want the palm-sized distractions off and out of sight during the school day.

The proposed rules on Tuesday's School Board agenda outline strict consequences. If students disobey, they would receive one warning before having their cell phones confiscated. Three strikes would result in detention. On the fourth offense, the student would face in-school suspension.

Sounds like enough to make students long to be in Pinellas, where administrators at some campuses permit cell phone use after school and during lunch.

To see what Gradebook readers had to say about cell phones in schools, see our recent poll results here.

Comments

[La di Da]

So does that mean one warning a year, or a day, or just in one class, or how about in every class? Once again the school board is writing policies that students will find ways around. So with the way this is written a student can take out their phone in every class and just be given a warning. The next day they can do the same thing. Seems like no new policy.

[teacher]

this is a joke... any teacher that tries to enforce this will spend the entire day taking away cell phones... the ISS room with be overflowing with cell cases... administrators will laugh at the referral that says using a cell phone in class... this shows how policies like this one are out of touch... I see hundreds of cell phone uses a day... as soon as I turn my back or look the other way they are out texting... I ask please put it away... they do for a little bit, but then it's out again. The two times I took a phone, the students FLIPPED out, yelling and cursing...

[John]

I thought that teaching something to someone meant changing their behavior patterns. To give repeated 'chances' to students for continually using their cell phones does not teach them the importance of listening to the teacher during class. End of course exams will have to be instituted and the grades will have to stick. If the child thinks it is more important to text a friend instead of listening to the teacher then I guess the child will have to suffer the consequences of their behavior.

[11 more days]

Ha ha. News flash - "reelect (generic school board member)... s/he jumped right on the cell phone problem back in '08."
Get real - just coming up with new rules then dumping them on the teachers to enforce doesn't solve a thing, but it might make for a cool video byte on Action Eyewitness Newscenter 4... At least on the days when Ragusa isn't in court and Bikini Fishing Charter Teacher stays in the house.
So long as parents keep buying MP3s, PSPs and Razrs for their little darlings, but not springing for paper and pencil, whatever HCSB or PCSB do is just moving deck chairs on the Titanic. Lots of opps for the kids in the fast food and housekeeping industries, though.

Great idea, but will it be done? Will the teachers follow through, or will it be too much effort? Will the admin follow through when the teachers do their part, or will the fall to parent complaints?