SACRAMENTO, California — California and South Carolina could become the next states to restrict cellphone use in schools, with state officials set to take up the issue on Tuesday.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom is sending letters to school districts urging them to limit students’ use of smartphones on campus. And the South Carolina State Board of Education is expected to approve guidelines Tuesday to limit students’ access to phones.
The efforts are part of a broader push by officials in Utah, Florida, Louisiana and elsewhere to limit cellphone use in schools to reduce distractions in the classroom and address the impact of social media on the mental health of children and teens.
But progress can be a challenge. Cell phone bans are already in effect in many schools, but they are not always enforced.
Districts must “act now” to help students focus on school by limiting their smartphone use, Newsom said in the letter. He also cited risks to young people’s well-being, a topic that gained renewed attention in June after U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called on Congress to require warning labels on social media platforms.
“Every classroom should be a place of focus, learning and growth,” the Democrat said in his letter. “Working together, teachers, administrators and parents can create an environment where students are fully engaged in their education, free from the distractions of phones and the pressures of social media.”
Newsom said earlier this summer that he planned to tackle smartphone use among studentsand his letter says he is working on it with the state legislature. Tuesday’s announcement is not a mandate, but it does urge districts to take action.
Newsom signed a law in 2019 that gives school districts the authority to regulate student smartphone use during school hours.
The debate over banning cellphones in schools to improve academic performance isn’t new. But officials often turn to bans as a solution instead of finding ways to integrate digital devices as learning tools, said Antero Garcia, a professor at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education.
“What strikes me is the inability of society to move forward and find solutions other than continually falling back on the conversation of, ‘Should we ban devices?’ as the primary solution to something that hasn’t worked,” Garcia said.
“It’s a great idea to suggest limiting cell phone use in schools,” he added. “What that means for the high school teacher next week, when many schools start, is a very different picture.”
Some schools and districts in California have already taken action. The Santa Barbara Unified and Los Angeles Unified school districts have implemented bans on student cell phone use in recent years.
But some school board advocates say the state should not go further and impose a blanket ban on cellphone use. That decision should be left up to districts, said Troy Flint, spokesman for the California School Boards Association.
“Cell phone and social media use on campus is certainly a serious issue and deserves to be looked at very carefully,” Flint said. “But those decisions are very specific to particular schools and particular communities, and they need to be made at the local level.”
There is no silver bullet to protect students from the risks of smartphones, but the state is “opening a conversation” about how school districts can act, said David Goldberg, president of the California Teachers Association.
“It makes sense that we as adults would seek out and try to care for students and give them a safe place to learn,” he said. “How we do that is also really important: that we make sure that we engage students and teachers in these conversations.”
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Austin is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues. Follow Austin on X: @sophieadanna