Smart Devices

The government app — known as CBP One — has become part of the ongoing political debate around how the government is handling immigration, with advocates criticizing it as being prone to glitches.

A proposal at Worcester Public Schools in Massachusetts to allow students to keep their cellphones during the day but not use them in class for non-educational material has received both support and criticism.

There are more than enough studies showing the harmful effects of phone addiction on developing minds to justify imposing limits on using cellphones in school. Those who have done so are reporting all positive outcomes.

More than four years after it sold thousands of unneeded iPads to Cornerstone Technologies, Rochester Public Schools is suing the company for allegedly making late, insufficient or no payments.

Project Tomorrow’s 2024 Speak Up report found that many elementary students lack access to personal devices after school, while students at higher grade levels are not using technology much for collaborative purposes.

House Bill 485 would require students to keep electronic devices out of the classroom, with some exceptions, and require schools to adopt policies to govern Internet use and teach students about hazards of social media.

Winners of Apple’s Swift Student Challenge will attend the company’s Worldwide Developers Conference in June, showing off app concepts they built using an Apple-developed coding language.

Now that Florida state law has given school districts the green light to restrict cellphone use in classrooms, school boards across the Tampa Bay area are deciding how to approach the issue.

Keegan Lee was in ninth grade when she realized her addiction to social media apps had become "all-consuming." She has spent much of the past several years writing and raising awareness about social media addiction.

Separating kids from smartphones is a challenge, with polling showing more than 95 percent of teens have access to the devices and 54 percent say it'd be at least somewhat hard to give up social media.

The Conneaut Area City Schools Board of Education voted to buy new Chromebooks and improve the sound systems at a middle school and high school. Five to 12 laptops each day, out of 1,600 total, need repairs.

A divided state House on Tuesday passed a bill that would have Pennsylvania do something all its nearby neighbors have done — ban the use of handheld cell phones by drivers.

The redesigned platform — believed to be the first of its kind at launch — enhances how residents, businesses and governments can access and view statewide land ownership data. Mobile performance and print functions are also improved.

Amid a growing body of research and lawsuits related to the subject, social media addiction was the focus of a presentation at the National School Boards Association conference this week, featuring a student with firsthand experience.

Officials at Quincy School District in Washington say phones have changed the dynamics of bullying by extending it beyond school hours, and most bullying incidents start on social media.

Data and anecdotes alike have shown excessive use of smartphones and social media are negatively impacting students' social-emotional skills. Many school districts are implementing programs to counter this.

Clinical psychologist Lisa Strohman connects technology overuse with rampant mental health problems in young people, and she says they will need help from parents, teachers and administrators to deal with this.

Some students feel unfairly restricted by Fresno Unified School District's use of an app to regulate their trips outside classrooms during instructional periods. They are allowed two seven-minute bathroom breaks per day.