By Abigale Paterniti, News Editor
A recent policy impacting students’ phone usage in school started on Monday, March 3, 2025. As a result, personal devices are off-limits from the start of the school day to the end. This includes lunch time and in the hallway; students can’t access their phones from the first bell to the last.
One commonality between students has been confusion and difficulty over the loss of AirPods accompanying the phone policy. Junior Sharvi Wankade is among one of many who relied on listening to music while completing assignments. Explaining how “[she] works best listening to music and finds it hard to concentrate in an environment where it’s really loud so without access to AirPods [she’s] found it hard to get work done when given the opportunity to work on assignments individually.”
Similarly, Junior Quennah Wightman shares that the loss of AirPods, “makes me feel more unfocused; if I can listen to music it improves my focus.” Often, listening to music is an outlet for students, especially those who experience anxiety before tests, projects or other school-related expectations. On this note, Quennah elaborates “A lot of it is not the phone ban itself but the tension it creates. If you want to check the time or check your grades you can’t do that efficiently so it causes anxiety.” To further her point, “the fact that they have an administrator come down to take your phone is really scary.” Many students like Quennah have anxiety over the intensity of the administration’s response.
Senior Neal Goturi continued Quennah’s observation mentioning another moment where admins response seems “extreme.” “Why does a teacher have to stop what they are doing to single out a kid? Calling admin seems unnecessary.” In other instances, the phone ban is a distraction from class instruction, arguably more than the phones were themselves. As Neal offers, the phone ban “takes time away from what could be used as instruction time.”
Sharvi, like Neal, noticed this, explaining that for her, “it made everything harder. Submitting my work online by scanning assignments was a common occurrence in a number of my classes and without access to my phone that is only something I’m able to do at home.” Thus, limiting Sharvi’s ability to be time efficient.
To encompass the student body’s opinion on the phone ban, Neal explains that most believe it’s “too far reaching. It could have been a good idea but all the times that a teacher isn’t teaching, and students are at lunch, phones were an outlet from isolation.” Thus, students hope that the “committee reassesses how admin reacts to the policy.” With the trial run from March to the end of the year and reassessing next school year.
Most Seniors are taking a moderate stance on the policy. From an anonymous Senior, “It wasn’t as bad as I thought it was. Everyone thought it would be worse.” Yet this same Senior also reflects how, “I will be gone in 2 months. I really don’t care, yet I rather not have it. They are doing too much, with not having it at lunch or in the hallways.”
Teachers like students are also shaping their own opinions on the phone ban. Mrs. Martin, a River Hill English teacher, shares that “It is an adjustment” explaining that, “there are times where I asked a student to stay after school and they say ‘let me text my mom’ but they can’t, so instead they have to email.” This is one notable adjustment, the loss of easy communication. Sophomore Emery Skolkin shares a similar difficulty: “the phone ban is putting me out of contact with parents and baseball coach. I just heard that my practice was moved from directly after school to later tonight, so now I have to figure out how to get home, but I can’t because I don’t have access to my phone.” Yet, Mrs. Martin shares that, “On the other hand students have adjusted really fast. They are talking to each other more, playing Uno together, which I think is a great thing.”
Comparably, there have been other factors besides easy communication that have had an effect on student accessibility. Mr. Tromble, River Hill Journalism Teacher, accounts for his students, “We knew it was coming so we made one adjustment. We ordered a lot of new recorders because before, the staff used their phones a lot to record interviews so obviously the ban had a big impact on our day to day ability to interview and do journalism.” Yet, the Journalism Staff have overcome this difficult adjustment with new recording devices to work with and a positive outlook.
Another notable adjustment is within the Media Center. Typically students with lunch passes would venture into the Media Center during lunch time for extra time to work and a quiet space. Mr. Ahr, River Hill’s media specialist, explains that for most it has been a “pretty smooth adjustment, a little bit difficult to imagine what lunch time would be like.” Mrs. Shagogue, the other media specialist, shared that, “It will be hard initially for students, teachers and administrators to adjust, but ultimately I support the cell phone ban. It will allow students to focus while in class and improve their social wellbeing and productivity in classes.” Everything is difficult at first, but over time it will have positive outcomes,” but, “I don’t want to discredit that it will be a hard adjustment.”
From an Administration point of view, Mr. Robb also shares his opinion on the adjustment, “The students are adjusting well. There is a bit of withdrawal and temptation. There is a bit of a cat and mouse game of ‘am I going to get caught.’ If everyone is driving 90 mph eventually they will get caught, so avoid the habit, follow the rules, and you will be fine.”
Overall, the phone ban has been an adjustment for both students, teachers and administrators. As serious as the policy is, the admin’s goal has been to lighten the atmosphere with teachers and administrators dressing in suits and sunglasses on March 3rd, the first day of the ban. Even without their phones, students were seen laughing and exclaiming, “they look like Men In Black!”