Cellphones causing ‘major disruptions’ in the classroom, Brockville, Ont., school warns parents

Concerned about “engagement and learning skills” in her school’s Grade 9 math class, a principal in Brockville, Ont., has emailed a letter to parents promising a crackdown on cellphones in the classroom.

“Cell phones are causing major disruptions to learning,” wrote the Thousand Islands Secondary School (TISS) principal in the April 1 email, describing a recent experiment conducted by one of the school’s math teachers.

“[The teacher] asked her class to turn on their notifications for a one hour class on Thursday, March 28th,” wrote the principal. “As you can see, the class of 25 students had a combined 190 notifications in just 60 minutes.”

CBC reached out to the Upper Canada District School Board (UCDSB) to request interviews with the principal and the teacher, but the board declined.

According to a handwritten tally included in the email, the messaging app Snapchat garnered the most notifications by far, ringing in at 143 during the hour.

TISS has about 900 students in grades 7-12, and 156 in Grade 9.

Some of the kids that I know stopped bringing their phone to class because their grades are getting really bad. – Ava Cross, Grade 9 student

On Sunday, Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce announced new measures to restrict cellphone use in schools, with students in grades 7-12 being banned from using their phones during class time without permission.

The measures, Lecce promised, would come into effect in September.

Still, schools and faculties across the country have been contending with the devices for years, with several school boards drafting their own policies. Earlier this year, Toronto District School Board trustees voted in favour of developing their own plan to limit cellphone use in classrooms.

Last month, four school boards filed lawsuits against social media giants Meta Platforms Inc., Snap Inc. and ByteDance Ltd. — the companies that operate the platforms Facebook and Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok respectively — seeking $4.5 billion in total damages.

The boards allege the apps were designed to negatively rewire the way children think, behave and learn, while also disrupting the way schools operate.

Cellphone crackdown

In the letter, the principal warned that if students brought their phones out during class the teacher would confiscate them and give the back at the end. Any phone use during class would “be solely at the invitation of the teacher,” it said.

That “uniformed front” was nice to see, said Jonathan Cross, whose 15-year-old daughter Ava is in Grade 9 at TISS.

“I couldn’t imagine being a teacher this day and age and having constant distractions in the classroom,” Cross said.

Despite Snapchat being the most popular app among her peers, Ava said she doesn’t have it on her phone — in fact, her parents won’t allow it.

“There’s a lot of reasons. You can add people that you don’t know and then they could be pretending to be someone that they’re not,” she said. “It’s just really scary because there’s a lot that can go on.”

Teachers at TISS have been taking phones away since the letter went out, Ava said. Other students are working harder to manage their own phone habits.

“Some of the kids that I know stopped bringing their phone to class because their grades are getting really bad,” she said. “But most of the kids, they just don’t care at all.”

While she admits she’s on her phone three to four hours in the evening, “at school, that’s my social time so I’m not on it a whole lot there because I’m talking to friends and stuff,” Ava said.

Still, her father said it’s easy for kids to get caught up on their phones. In part, Cross blames the pandemic.

“Society in general went to a lot of technology to cope through COVID and connecting that way, and now some people just utilize that more than face-to-face skills — and that’s not just students,” he said.

Concerns over attendance

The principal’s letter also expressed concerns around poor attendance among Grade 9 students.

“We have students who miss one to two classes a week in each subject,” the letter reads. “This builds up quickly causing students to feel lost and behind, and having even less motivation to attend.”

While the UCDSB refused to share the rate of absenteeism among Grade 9 students, superintendent Bill Loshaw said it’s concerning.

“Generally, we are seeing students being away from school more often, which is the trend across the province,” he wrote in an email to CBC.

“The concern of students being distracted in class, missing valuable class time and understanding the importance of being physically and mentally present at school is what prompted the letter,” Loshaw wrote, adding teachers have noticed attendance has improved since the principal’s letter went out.

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