Smart Devices

While many teachers and administrators have reported positive changes after phone bans, students found ways to bypass those rules by slipping calculators or dummy phones into pouches, or switching to smartwatches.

A school board in New Jersey adopted a policy prohibiting its own members from using smart devices during board meetings, aiming to lead by example after adopting phone restrictions for students last September.

A student group at Denham Springs High School won the national Samsung Solve for Tomorrow STEM competition with a project involving sensors to monitor Lake Maurepas and relay data to a public app.

Technology being deployed at 53 parking facilities serving the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority will guide drivers to open spots, and offer a real-time look at demand and other information.

While a proposed bill addressing smartphones in schools makes its way through the Legislature, West Virginia teachers attest to the seriousness of the problem and the benefits of parting students from their phones.

At the nation's second-largest school system, smartphones can be used on buses to school but not during class, lunch or breaks. Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said most teachers and students have embraced the policy.

Using student population data on factors like age, sex, years in school, race and ethnicity, researchers used artificial intelligence to help counselors understand which groups might benefit from additional resources.

A professor's video for her African American studies course at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University inspired a hashtag that became a repository for educational content from other Black creators.

North Carolina's largest school district will soon deploy the RAVE panic button app, which can give a user's location to 911, notify school staff and make critical information available to first responders.

A bill making its way through the Texas Legislature would require every school district to have a policy requiring students to keep cellphones in storage lockers throughout the school day.

News literacy lessons, which teach students to use critical thinking in conjunction with the Internet to separate fact from fiction, are essential to prepare students to navigate the digital information ecosystem.

A high schooler in central Washington won the regional Congressional App Challenge with an app that uses a database to store user reports and shows relevant threats to farmers depending on their location on a heat map.

The school board of a large district in Maryland voted 7-1 to keep personal devices silenced and stowed away between the first and last bells of the school day, with exceptions for emergencies.

Days after Gov. Phil Murphy’s call for statewide restrictions on cellphone use in schools, many districts have adopted policies that seem to steer clear of what might be considered an absolute ban.

Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell recommends that schools issue “bell-to-bell” bans on personal electronic devices during the school day and develop curriculum guidelines for teaching digital media literacy.

The New York Daily News Editorial Board supports a proposed ban on smartphones in New York schools from bell to bell, given exemptions for special circumstances, because it will refocus students on what's important.

Proposed legislation would ban phones, tablets, smartwatches and any other Internet-connected devices from school grounds during the day, from bell to bell, including both instructional and non-instructional time.

Since cellphone rules went into effect at the beginning of the 2024-25 school year, some Connecticut school districts said they have seen improvements in academic achievement, attendance and discipline.