The Burke County Board of Education recently heard an update from Kristin Edwards, director of digital teaching and learning, and Desarae Kirkpatrick, director of secondary education, about how the balanced instruction initiative has gone since it was implemented in August.
Edwards said every student logs in via ClassLink, and all of the county apps are pushed out through the platform. To find out what kind of impact the initiative was having on students, staff looked at the week of Oct. 27 this school year and compared it to the week of Oct. 28, 2024, Edwards said.
The study found that K-5 students saw a 17 percent reduction in the amount of screen time, sixth to eighth grade students saw a 13 percent reduction in the amount of screen time and high school students saw an increase of 3.9 percent in screen time, Edwards said.
Edwards said a survey sent to teachers, administrators and parents at the beginning of January sought feedback on their perception of how the balanced instruction initiative is going.
Some of the survey questions asked:
- Do they feel or perceive that their students had an improved student engagement in their classroom?
- Do they feel their student is improving in reading comprehension, improving in handwriting, improving in retention of knowledge?
- Do they feel the initiative has positively impacted their student in their overall well-being?
- Do they feel the school is maintaining an appropriate balance of screen time and paper and pencil, or traditional instruction, technology use?
The survey also asked parents whether they support the initiative, she said.
Edwards said the response was overwhelmingly supportive of the initiative in all grades.
Kirkpatrick said parents who responded to the survey noted improved penmanship with fine motor skills in lower grades, improved penmanship and written expression in the upper grades, stronger reading skills as a result of the increased focus in addition and positive changes in student behavior. Parents also highlighted a difference in home routines, including reduced homework conflict and better sleep patterns, as well as a stronger family and school connection, Kirkpatrick said.
As for the physical effects of reduced screen time, parents noted reduced headaches, eye strain and screen-related fatigues, Kirkpatrick said.
She said staff are open to continuing to look at improvements and sharing those with administrators and school leadership teams.
Some of the challenges parents shared were inconsistent implementation of reduced screen time across classrooms and schools, with some parents reporting frustration with inconsistent communication about the change of instruction and the reasons behind it, Kirkpatrick said.
Kirkpatrick said teachers also support the initiative. She said teachers noted improved student engagement, stronger social skills, which leads to an increase in positive student-to-student discourse and collaboration and improved retention of information. Teachers also reported spending less time policing students on their computers.
Some challenges teachers noted said some students showed an initial resistance to more paper-based tasks, and some teachers would also like a clearer definition of the balanced instruction initiative and some more teacher autonomy, Kirkpatrick said.
Edwards said an unintended result of the initiative was a reduction of student behavior incidents of 26.2 percent in office referrals under the category of misuse of technology from 2024 to 2025. Paper use also is going up, she said.
One of the things administrators said in the survey is it resembles pre-Covid learning environments, said Board Chairman Tiana Beachler, which she said is where the school system is trying to get back to.
Beachler said because Burke County was the first to do it, there was no guideline, so she would like for the board to focus on the initiative at its May retreat. She said she thinks the school system is on the right track.
© 2026 The News Herald, Morganton, N.C. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
