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Dutch rules will soon prevent schoolchildren from having a phone in classroom

340 points by the-dude 3y ago

cheeseface 3y ago
Every country should have legislation in place that allows this.
throw_pm23 3y ago
Realized 10+ years ago that the only way I could have my kids grow up addiction-free was if they didn't have a smartphone/tablet and the only credible way I could ask this from them was if I also didn't have one. In hindsight one of the best decisions of my life, sadly becoming more and more difficult to maintain as banking, public transportation, restaurants, and all other parts of life increasingly assume you carry a smartphone.
- namanyayg 3y ago
  Great commitment. What about work tho, do you only work while sitting down in front of your workstation then?
  - tokai 3y ago
    >only work while sitting down in front of your workstation As you should no matter if you have a smart phone or not.
  - eur0pa 3y ago
    As it should be
  - throw_pm23 3y ago
    Not sure which typical workplaces require smartphone use (I'm sure there are many), but indeed, in my case, I work either at the computer or in front of people or walking up and down while thinking :)
    - MattGaiser 3y ago
      I would have thought any using 2FA for anything would essentially require it.
      - derwiki 3y ago
        Yubikey is a good alternative
      - throw_pm23 3y ago
        I haven't yet encountered situations with mandatory 2FA, but indeed, this is the kind of thing I expect to become widespread, making it more and more difficult to those without a smartphone.
        ghaff 3y ago
        Company TFA is less of a problem than other things as they’ll use a token rather than SMS and you can always use a hardware token. I have a soft token on my phone but it’s not required.
      - arp242 3y ago
        Not really; very few 2FA methods are tied to a specific smartphone app.
      - Semaphor 3y ago
        You can use a YubiKey for 2FA, I think even for TOTP, but as I am a Smartphone user, I use my phone when only TOTP is available.
      - gsich 3y ago
        You can use TOTP on your PC too.
      - vitro 3y ago
        You can have TOTP as a browser extension. Not saying you should, just that there is a possibility. A bonus is easier backup of secrets so loosing your phone does not lock you out.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - tome 3y ago
    > What about work tho, do you only work while sitting down in front of your workstation then? This question is fascinating to me! What form of work requires using a smart phone?
    - achenet 3y ago
      I know some tattoo artists that use their smartphones a lot for discussing ideas with clients, sharing images of their work, etc, via Instagram. Could in theory be done with a camera + computer, but probably easier with smartphone.
    - goodbyesf 3y ago
      Any development work where uptime is important? Especially if SLA is involved. If your product has issues, the client bothers management and management will certainly want to bother you.
    - ghaff 3y ago
      To some degree you can be contactable when traveling or otherwise away from your desk with a feature phone but only partially. You’d certainly be that quirky person with the odd anti-smartphone habit.
    - gspencley 3y ago
      As a software eng something that bothers me is that every single employer that I have worked for has assumed that you would have no problem installing work-related software on your phone. The most common offender is MFA related software. I run GrapheneOS on my phone and don't have the Google Play stuff installed. And kind of the entire point of this is that I don't want to run proprietary, closed-source stuff on my phone at all. I also like not having a ton of bloatware/spyware installed by the manufacturer that I can't remove. So anyway, I usually protest and say that I can't, and that if I'm required to use a mobile device for work purposes then I need the company to provide me with one. Often arrangements can be made by requesting a device that can double for other work related functions. For example, I currently have a work-issued iPad with Okta Verify installed on it that also let's me reach for Safari and do iOS specific dev & testing when needed. But it does show the creep. Companies just assume that they can request that you use your mobile device for things that you otherwise wouldn't, and that you will have no problem complying. IMO saying either "I don't own a smartphone" or "I refuse to use my personal devices for work related purposes" should be a no-questions-asked accepted position. And while I've yet to be met with hostility by saying that, it is unfortunately such a minority position that it is almost always the first time they've heard an objection.
- gonehome 3y ago
  Lots of respect for this - I’d guess your kids have it too. I often felt frustrated as a kid that adults took power and control over you and didn’t adhere to the same demands themselves.
  - kelipso 3y ago
    Seems like contrived logic made by a kid who really wants something. Adults can drive, drink, etc.
    - anjel 3y ago
      Similarly, the emergent generation in American often reject learning to drive a car, as renunciation of the anthropocentric lifestyle.
      - ilyt 3y ago
        I'd imagine it's more coz they can't afford it or have place to store it than anything else
        bobthepanda 3y ago
        Nah, driving is also stressful and traffic is not fun. I’ve seen recently a fair amount of car enthusiasts start buying into the walkable cities/public transit mantra, because a car enthusiast does not find city/suburban stop and go traffic to be the thing they’re enthusiastic about.
        ilyt 3y ago
        Right but that didn't change in last 20 years. Cities that suck driving (and walking) in now sucked as much and more 20 years ago. It's not that that changed how much people want to have driving license.
        bobthepanda 3y ago
- browningstreet 3y ago
  My college student still won't take a cell phone. His uni gave him an iPad but he leaves it home most of the time. It can happen. And since he doesn't have a cellphone, I don't pick mine up so much when we're hanging out together. Win-win.
- nixpulvis 3y ago
  I’m rather disturbed by the discompassion society has towards people without smartphones. Be it menus at restaurants, banking apps (as you mention), or even map availability. We just assume everyone is connected all the time and that phones never break or have issues. I feel crazy, because my phone is constantly misbehaving.
  - TotalCrackpot 3y ago
    Industrial society is coercive towards people that want to live more primitive life than one deem normal, that's essentially main thesis of anarcho-primitivists. Still, I don't think Luddites should ban for other people their technology. Why not ban electricity and cars too?
    - xethos 3y ago
      I'm not asking others to give up smartphones, just like I'm not asking others to give up stairs or cars. I only want the world to remain accessible to those without. Keep paper menus, build a ramp, and maintain cycling or public transit infrastructure.
      - TotalCrackpot 3y ago
        Ok, I agree with that. I think there should be more effort put towards infrastructure for people with disabilities too.
  - SoftTalker 3y ago
    I think this is overstated. I can't think of anything essential I cannot do without a smartphone or computer. You have to do it like it's 1985, which is foreign to the last generation or two, but it's still doable.
    - logifail 3y ago
      > I can't think of anything essential I cannot do without a smartphone or computer [..] it's still doable Q: Have you never been to a restaurant which has done away with physical menus ("because Covid") and has a QR code which you're supposed to scan with your device?
- nologic01 3y ago
  > as banking, public transportation, restaurants, and all other parts of life increasingly assume you carry a smartphone People have not worked through the wide ranging implications of this "assumption", given who builds and controls everything about those devices.
chronogram 3y ago
Schools don't already ban them from the classroom?
- amelius 3y ago
  In France they do. https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexledsom/2019/08/30/the-mobile-phone-ban-in-french-schools-one-year-on-would-it-work-elsewhere/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexledsom/2019/08/30/the-mobil...
- bollos 3y ago
  They have for a while now in my experience. I'm not sure if it's still a thing, but there used to be these like sacks at the door with numbered pockets in which you'd put your phone until the end of that specific class.
  - nerdbert 3y ago
    Based on visiting a lot of Dutch schools this year, that's still very much happening. I tried to google a photo but couldn't figure out what the word for that thing is.
- Aachen 3y ago
  My Dutch school in the back-end of nowhere (insofar as the country has that) was very progressive with their phone ban in 2006, apparently. Per the article "Schools and teachers have been asking for rules to restrict the use of mobile phones in the classroom" I didn't know that they need permission to enact rules towards an orderly teaching environment. Sounds implausible but what do I know A notable omission from the article is how many schools already have this rule, because I can't imagine that any of them just lets the kids be on their phone during lessons. You're also not allowed to talk while the teacher is explaining something, or aren't allowed to work on homework for another subject or so. So even learning is prohibited if it's not for the right subject you're allocated right now: that's already in place, but banning phones is a problem? Curious
- criddell 3y ago
  My kids’ high school required kids have a smartphone. They wanted them using the calendar to track tests and assignments, they used the camera quite a bit both for assignments (make a short video about blah blah blah) and for quick notes (take a picture of the homework assignment on the white board). There was a twitter-like app for the teacher to broadcast information to the students and I believe students could message their teacher.
ajsnigrutin 3y ago
I have no idea why this has to be a government-based rule (law? ... assuming they won't fix it until oct. 1st). Although I'm older, and phones were not as common as now, our schools had "school-rules" forbidding the use during classes, and if you got caught with a phone, the teacher would take it, and parents would have to come to school and pick it up. Are schools unable to implement simple rules and need the government to do it now? I'm bothered mostly, because school rules are school rules. Need to adapt? Need some "modification" of the rules? A teacher can do it. If it's government rules, there are pretty sure to be some edge cases, where someone will have to break those rules to achieve something positive.
- rvanlaar 3y ago
  Here's Arjen Lubach, the Dutch Jon Stewart, about phones in classrooms. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cclEuSxFd_M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cclEuSxFd_M Note: The autogenerated (english) subtitles are a pretty decent.
  - Semaphor 3y ago
    Is it possible to get the transcript in English without watching a 13 minute video?
    - 9991 3y ago
      yt-dlp will give it to you.
- pbmonster 3y ago
  > I have no idea why this has to be a government-based rule You clearly have not met today's parents. Enough of them revolt at the idea of a teacher taking - even temporarily - the $1000 device they bought for their child and which they need to monitor/contact/supervise their child 24/7. A rule like that might help teachers and schools to get overbearing parents off their backs.
  - ajsnigrutin 3y ago
INTPenis 3y ago
It should be more specific, they should not be allowed a smartphone in school at all. But a phone, yes definitely. In europe it's a lot more common to send your kids alone to school, so I definitely think they should have a simple phone. But at the same time I want them to go to school without any smartphone, I want them to feel that freedom from social media at least during the school day. Not just that school locks them up, but that they eventually learn to not even bring it.
- kergonath 3y ago
  > It should be more specific, they should not be allowed a smartphone in school at all. But a phone, yes definitely. In europe it's a lot more common to send your kids alone to school, so I definitely think they should have a simple phone. That’s the usual policy here in France. Smartphones are not allowed at all. Dumb phones are but they can’t be taken out of the bags in the classroom, which makes sense. I am much more comfortable giving my kid a dumb feature phone as well. It’s enough to send text messages and call in an emergency, but it makes him less of a target for mugging.
  - balfirevic 3y ago
    > That’s the usual policy here in France. Smartphones are not allowed at all. Do they search the kid's bags?
    - orwin 3y ago
      No, they take it if they see them out, either during class or recess.
    - kergonath 3y ago
      Not without a reason, but suspecting you have a smartphone, or any other forbidden or dangerous item, is one. So in practice you’re fine if you don’t use it, show it, or brag about it.
    - TwistySanta 3y ago
      They searched us without knowledge in the UK. I went to school 2007-2012 so the laws might have changed since then, or this might have been illegal. In PE class one day, we all got changed and left our clothes and bags in the changing room, then while we were on the field doing sport the deputy headteacher went to the changing room and went through everyone's bags and blazers to find phones and valuables. He took them all and made everyone think they had been stolen. He revealed it after five minutes of the class noticing things were missing, and said it was supposed to be a lesson about safety. How theft happens and we shouldn't have valuable items on us at school, and if we do then they should be locked away somewhere secure when we leave our bags somewhere. I doubt that was actually the case, I think he was just trying to get an idea of how many people have smartphones, and who those people were. This was right when they were invented so it was very rare for a kid to have one when I was a first year, but every year more and more kids got them handed down from their parents.
tokai 3y ago
National legislators should stay out of the classrooms. Let parents and the actual experts in teaching at each individual school organize themselves how they see fit. Politicians sadly love hands-on-management of issues instead of focusing on enabling and facilitating actual people controlling their own lives.
- thriftwy 3y ago
  The whole idea of a school system is that the country government mandates a common denominator of education (including propaganda) to be delivered to all of its children (usually for free). Of course it may be more granular than the whole country, but schools organizing themselves as they see fit is an exception.
- eimrine 3y ago
  > Let parents and the actual experts in teaching at each individual school organize themselves how they see fit. Parents seems to be extra in this statement. Decent parents can be evil and/or letting their kids too much, but a decent teacher can not.
Thrio499 3y ago
Smartphone is essential tool for normal life today. One can not even pay or use public transport without smartphone! Owning it should be basic human right, like wearing clothes! Large number of students in Nederlands do not speak local language. Smartphone is essential for translation and communication with them. It also allows calling 911, and video/audio recording evidence, if there are any misunderstandings. This rule feels like teachers are solving their problems at expense of students!
- CalRobert 3y ago
  I'm a parent. We're moving to the Netherlands next month. I just sent emails to the local taalschool in Hilversum (and two basisschools) to ensure that my daughters learn Dutch as fast as possible upon our arrival because learning the local language is critical for living a full life. Any parent who doesn't do this, except _perhaps_ for those who know they're on a short-term stint for work or similar, is being negligent.
  - bollos 3y ago
    Small correction that it would be "basisscholen" in the plural form. I hope you enjoy your stay here in NL :)
    - CalRobert 3y ago
      Dank u wel! Hopefully within a year my daughter is helping me get details like that correct :-)
  - Thrio499 3y ago
    There are people who do not want to learn Dutch. I sincerely wish all best to you and your kid. Please stay on her side, and not on side of some imagininary ideology.
- misnome 3y ago
  This feels like you didn’t even read the thread title. “In Classroom” != “they are banned from owning”. And I’m not sure that calling 911 would help them, in the Netherlands.
msla 3y ago
This is very, very dangerous, especially if an emergency happens and the teacher is out of the room or slow to respond. Yes, emergencies happened before cell phones. People died of them more often back then.
- code_runner 3y ago
  So interested in seeing some sources for “tragedies at schools causing death preventable by smartphone access during instruction”
- misnome 3y ago
  This reads like pure hysteria. Do you have any evidence or statistics about rates of “Classroom Emergencies” to base this panic on? Specifically those outside of the US, we know that is an outlier.
  - msla 3y ago
    Can you do this without bringing a completely unrelated country into it? The United States of America isn't the main character of history.
    - bscphil 3y ago
      That the US should not be the focal point of an argument about phones in schools is exactly the point that the parent comment was making.
      - msla 3y ago
        I never brought up the US.
    - michaelt 3y ago
      What misnome means is: Don't criticise this Dutch school rule if you can only do so using American school shooting statistics.
everybodyknows 3y ago
> Children will soon be prevented from bringing mobile phones into Dutch classrooms. "Prevent"? Forbidding is easy. Actually preventing is another thing altogether. > Due to persistent signals from teachers that they are unable to keep smartphones out of the classroom on their own, ... So teachers already had the authority to forbid carrying of phones. Article offers no evidence that national authorities can do any better.
- tmpz22 3y ago
  Enforcement is a challenge but by making it a law you hopefully also co-opt parents to help with enforcement.
  - Aerroon 3y ago
    Alternatively it will teach children at a younger age to ignore laws.
    - esarbe 3y ago
      Or getting their phone confiscated and not being able to use it for a week or so will teach them the cost of ignoring laws. A useful life lesson in any case.
      - Aerroon 3y ago
        Sure, but if that happens how do you think they will feel about the teacher that did that? Do you think that kid will see eye to eye with the teacher after that?
        esarbe 3y ago
        That's a very silly question. "No phones in school" is no different from any other rule the teachers have to enforce in class. Let's try the same question, with another rule, to make the point; "Imagine a teacher stops some kids from beating up another kid; if that happens how do you think they will feel about the teacher that did that? Do you think that kid will see eye to eye with the teacher after that?" At some point there will be a need to set boundaries. That's the essence of socialization and necessarily a part of education. Teachers will have to set boundaries and enforce rules, that doesn't have anything to do with phones.
Rechtsstaat 3y ago
This is an older article. Today, the coalition decided on a measure with 'urgent advice' to not be allowed smartphones, tablets and smartwatches in the classroom [1]. Starting Jan 1st 2024, and so far only for secondary education, though they're deciding on primary education today.Schools are free in how they implement it, could be in the entire building or just classrooms. I don't expect any hard rules any time soon, with the coalition being so divided on the topic. There's been interesting debates in parlement preceding this measure, with several interesting position papers on the topic from researchers, and even student associations [2]. The researchers emphasize that adolescents are much more susceptible to the bad effects of smartphones, due to inexperience with dopamine and its effects on dopamine production, being easier to condition, FOMO. The main adverse effect they name is what they call a 'crumbling brain', with a short attention span unable to focus on one thing for a longer time. An often-repeated soundbyte is that students using smartphones often score in average 1-1.5 points less on tests, on a scale of 1 to 10. I dunno what to think about it. As noted by the student association, it seems like children won't get the chance to learn how to handle the traps smartphones pose. Then again, I was free to use mine in high school and I'm still addicted to the thing :/ [1] https://nos.nl/artikel/2481424-kabinet-geeft-dringend-advies-aan-scholen-telefoon-uit-de-klas https://nos.nl/artikel/2481424-kabinet-geeft-dringend-advies... [2] https://www.tweedekamer.nl/debat_en_vergadering/commissievergaderingen/details?id=2023A01131 https://www.tweedekamer.nl/debat_en_vergadering/commissiever...
- ctenb 3y ago
  The article says it's published at TUESDAY, 4 JULY 2023 - 14:26. Strange that its information is apparently outdated.
  - boredpudding 3y ago
    It's because 'nltimes.nl' is not a serious news outlet. It just translates things and reposts it.
    - ciropantera 3y ago
      I don’t know if this is the case, but I’ve noticed questionable news outlets reposting their own old articles, possibly to game google news search or something
LatteLazy 3y ago
Its sort of crazy that if I said we should ban computers or landline telephones or the internet from schools I'd be pilloried as a luddite. But everyone cheers banning smartphones. Because they are convinced (without evidence) that they are addictive. And of course, the best way to teach kids about addictive things is to give them zero exposure to them until they turn 18 (21 etc) then give them full, limitless, unsupervised access...
- maccard 3y ago
  Smartphones are being banned because they _are_ pocket computers. They're not being banned because they're phones. They're major distractions
- phito 3y ago
  No evidence that phones are addictive? Are you kidding me?
  - LatteLazy 3y ago
    It's the same evidence that video games cause violence: no evidence, but the worried well really WANT to believe it, and somehow everyone just convinces themselves it is true. To be clear, I am not saying kids SHOULD be on their phones in school or that no one has a bad relationship with their phone. Just that no one has actually bothered measuring this, they jumped straight to "it suits my prejudices so I believe it"...
- dahwolf 3y ago
  Where did you learn to dramatize like this? Smartphone?
CalRobert 3y ago
Between this and my kids actually being able to ride a bike around without getting mowed down by drivers I'm ecstatic to be moving there next month.
- chrismartin 3y ago
  To the extent you're willing to share, I'm curious what's bringing you there, and where you're moving from.
  - CalRobert 3y ago
    This is the gist of it: https://youtu.be/oHlpmxLTxpw https://youtu.be/oHlpmxLTxpw But I grew up in central California and surroundings in the 90's and rode my bike everywhere. And it was horrible. I nearly died multiple times, and drivers were sometimes furious at someone biking on the road. I rode from Sac to Folsom once over a narrow bridge with no shoulder and can't believe I lived. I thought it might be better in cities, but Berkeley, while better, was still mediocre, and Santa Monica was bad. Really, everywhere in the US is somewhere on the spectrum from "merely horrible" to "dire hellscape". Ten years ago my wife and I moved to Ireland. Ireland is also bad, but still massively better than anywhere I've lived in the US. But now we have young kids, and we don't want "better than the US", we want "good enough your child can bike to school, and when people kill children with their cars the people are angry with the driver, not sympathetic towards them". Which means the Netherlands, or perhaps Denmark. So that's where we're going. Ireland being wildly incompetent bureaucratically it took 4 years just to process mine and my wife's naturalisation applications.
    - ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
      I grew up riding bikes every damned day (including to and from school) in the Chicago suburbs and don't recall ever having an incident with a car. I also didn't tend to ride in busy streets. Teach your kids how to survive.
      - jackson1442 3y ago
deleted 3y ago
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rootusrootus 3y ago
I have to imagine this is already pretty common. Here in the US, my kids' schools are pretty restrictive on smartphones. At least through middle school, they'll confiscate it if you take it out during class or it rings. The elementary schools of course don't allow them at all on campus, though they're kind of okay with the cellular apple watch as long as the kid doesn't use it during class.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
eimrine 3y ago
This law is so good, almost perfect. The only thing that is missing is a segregation between FOSS and anything else. Computers w/ FOSS should be not only allowed but being a primary source of learning but proprietary software should be banned at schools.
bigbacaloa 3y ago
Every generation has trouble dealing with the changes in the younger generation. Imposing luddite behavior us just dumb. I speak as a father of teenagers. Better they learn responsible use than have it imposed.
- alexawarrior 3y ago
  [dead]
- cies 3y ago
  > Better they learn responsible use than have it imposed. Good that schools do not have to learn responsible use, or unlearn irresponsible use, by just banning it whole sale. You have the rest of their waking hours to do so (or not do so) as a parent.
- dahwolf 3y ago
  It's not dumb. The phone distracts from the goal, it's as simple as that.
  - strus 3y ago
    > The phone distracts from the goa So does life. I think we should lock the children in school from the beginning of the education period, without the access to the external, disctracting life. They can leave when they are 18.
darkclouds 3y ago
And just how do you capture teachers breaking the law at school? I've seen teachers hitting kids with metre long wooden rules around ankles, a teacher throwing a kid into some music stands and reportedly out of a window, and much more. Seeing is believing but authority figures in all walks of life abuse their positions because they are only human!
- kwhitefoot 3y ago
  Which country was that in?
  - darkclouds 3y ago
    The UK. Where else did inspiration for Pink Floyds The Wall come from? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wall#Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wall#Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Happiest_Days_of_Our_Lives#Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Happiest_Days_of_Our_Lives... ""The Happiest Days of Our Lives" concerns Pink's youth, attending a school run by strict and often violent teachers who treat the pupils with contempt." You dont run an Empire by being nice!
- finikytou 3y ago
  just educate your children to have values. they will tell the truth. how do you think mankind did it before the phone.
  - abfan1127 3y ago
    given the reduction in both actual police violence and police brutality reports once body cams were introduced, I suspect mankind did a lot of lying before smart phones.
    - finikytou 3y ago
      I really hope you never hold any power. I recommend you a nice movie you can watch called videodrome.
cies 3y ago
Choosing children's mental health and focus on school work over allowing big biz to unload their addictive products upon us. Seems to be the good thing to do.
mschuster91 3y ago
What a load of short-sighted nonsense. Instead of revising curricula to be actually attractive and modernizing teaching instead of a drone blathering at the front of the classroom, ban phones. The problem at the core is that education has ossified. A toxic combination of parents unable to accept that their children can have a better school experience than they had ("we had to hike two hours even during storms to go to school, stop complaining!!!"), privileged parents wanting to keep classist privileges for their children (this is a huge problem here in Germany where we separate between useless Hauptschule, just as useless Realschule and Gymnasium after 4th/6th year), politicians intimidated by the huge influence the well-networked classist parents have, underpaid staff and underfunded schools, burnt-out teachers who long since have given up on changing anything because of the lack of time, funds, respect for their work and backing by superiors...
- wunderland 3y ago
  Alternatively, this has nothing to do with an outdated curriculum and is about removing a distraction that impacts learning of anything!
  - mschuster91 3y ago
    If kids rather want their phones than to listen to school, maybe it's time to change how school works. 30 kids having to sit still 6 hours a day and do nothing more than listen and take notes? That's boring as fuck. Even worse as a lot of the stuff they learn is something they'll literally never even think about once in their life and they'll have to forget again after the test to make room for more useless crap. And every attempt to innovate gets shot down somewhere, so the teachers aren't really willing to adapt either - when I went to school a decade ago we had more than one teacher who used the same transparent sheets on an overhead projector that he made (and copied) decades ago, written on a typewriter. Smaller class sizes, more teachers, interactive and engaging lessons... that's all stuff that only the private schools (Waldorf and friends) provide and it actually works out even with conventional metrics, but these are expensive and have issues on their own (e.g. the tendency to attract pedos and weirdos, of which there have been a fair share of scandals). Yes, I'm fed up with the sorry state of our education system.
xeromal 3y ago
This should go over as about as well as other abstinence-type programs.
bannedbybros 3y ago
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woudsma 3y ago
I can't imagine myself graduating high school if I had a smartphone back then. Those things are so addictive, they just keep on giving. When I was studying all you could play on your phone was Snake. Going out with friends and making a campfire was way more fun than playing Snake. Nowadays people can spend 14hrs a day on their phone and still not be bored, it's crazy. Deleting social media apps makes your phone _much_ less interesting though!
- bluescrn 3y ago
  Also, entire new forms of bullying, endless porn, and clickbait media with headlines that can be terrifying to adults, let alone kids.
- earthling8118 3y ago
  This is a sign of you being out of touch with the times. I can assure you that a phone wouldn't be the source of this problem. I would play Kerbal Space Program or any other game on the school computer. There weren't many options for them to stop it. We had http proxies, linux live CDs, you name it. The schools just simply couldn't lock them down properly. Even the students that weren't technically inclined didn't have difficulty, but there were plenty of people that did know what they were doing too.
  - qup 3y ago
    If you were playing KSP on your school computers, then you're just part of the current generation. We're old, kiddo. I was playing Oregon Trail.
    - kalupa 3y ago
      I'd say both are educational and being played on a school computer is acceptable
      - qup 3y ago
        Yes, and I would argue that when we were hacking school computer lab macs to play world of warcraft 3, in my later years, that was okay, too. School IT admins are assholes for no reason.
TotalCrackpot 3y ago
I fact-checked a lot of wrong information that my teachers were spewing by using the smartphone, I think this ban is bad. This should be a choice. These days even reading books can be more comfortable on a screen, and it is easier to have bigger catalogue (piracy cough cough). School is a horrible, authoritarian structure comparable to prison and mental ward already, there is no reason to make it more fucked up.
- binarymax 3y ago
  What stops you from fact checking after you get out of the school? I’m trying to understand how a child having a distracting and addicting smartphone is a good solution to the occasional misinformed teacher.
  - Aerroon 3y ago
    >What stops you from fact checking after you get out of the school? First, you will forget about all the bs they mentioned. Second, you can't confront the teacher over it or to ask them to clarify in a way that other kids will hear it too.
    - esarbe 3y ago
      You can always make notes, check later and then confront the teacher the next time you have class. Still not a reason for a kid t have a smartphone in school.
      - TotalCrackpot 3y ago
        There is one very simple reason. Fuck authoritarianism, especially when education is mandatory. Consider that a lot of people have public schooling with atrocious quality that is quite frankly quite useless, because it is mostly nationalistic, xenophobic, white-supremacists, elitist, classist, patriarchal etc. propaganda. It is actually not even useless a lot of the time, it is just harmful to a person to listen to these lies, so it's actually better if kids can drown out this propaganda by looking at a smartphone screen.
loeg 3y ago
I think this is probably a good thing. Even in the early 2000s, having phones in the classroom was mostly a distraction (texting, or having the ringer on and distracting others) or vehicle for cheating (also texting in those days). The only downside is in emergency situations where children should have some agency to contact family. If children could be trusted to turn their phones off at the start of class and leave them in their bags, that would be great, but I get the impression from teachers that that isn't the case.
tomsmeding 3y ago
Bad source, no sources are cited in the article. Dutch sources [1] [2] (reputable newspapers, both articles published today) mostly agree with this article, but the starting date is wrong. Schools will now start discussing how to implement such measures; the rule starts being in force starting January 1st, 2024. Even then there will not be a law yet, though a law may come, depending on cooperation from schools and I guess political climate. There is no mention of anything happening on October 1st. Now if NLTimes would have given us their sources, we might have known where they got that from. [1]: https://nos.nl/artikel/2481424-kabinet-geeft-dringend-advies-aan-scholen-telefoon-uit-de-klas https://nos.nl/artikel/2481424-kabinet-geeft-dringend-advies... [2]: https://www.ad.nl/politiek/mobieltje-in-de-klas-in-de-ban-ouders-staan-straks-niet-meer-alleen~a56c48a2/ https://www.ad.nl/politiek/mobieltje-in-de-klas-in-de-ban-ou...
- zdragnar 3y ago
  I remember when cell phones first started becoming a thing parents would get for their kids, especially those who took school trips for sports or debate etc. Even though this was pre-smartphone days, our school had a strict policy of no phones outside of lockers during the school day. If you were caught with one in a classroom, it was taken away and sent to the principal's office, where you would have to get it at the end of the day (typically after a stern talking to). What changed that teachers started letting kids have phones in classrooms? It is utterly mind boggling to me that it was ever allowed in the first place. Edit: To clarify, I'm in the US and phones in classrooms seem to be a common complaint among teachers. Something seems to have changed, just not sure what.
woodruffw 3y ago
NYC had a similar ban until 2015[1]. The problem was always enforcement: you can "prevent" students from having phones, but this means nothing unless (1) you're actively preventing them from bringing them onto schoolgrounds, and (2) taking phones away from students who do bring them into school. Part of why NYC lifted their ban was because neither (1) nor (2) was practical: schools ended up adopting an "out of sight, out of mind" policy around phones, and actual confiscations led to larger concerns (e.g., students who were unable to contact their caretakers after school). It will be interesting to see if the Dutch can overcome either (or both) of these problems. [1]: https://www.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/013-15/mayor-de-blasio-chancellor-fari-a-lift-school-cell-phone-ban https://www.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/013-15/mayor-de...
- light_hue_1 3y ago
  That's incredibly short sighted and disappointing. There is no place for cellphones in school. They're incredibly disruptive to classes and learning. Banning cellphones in schools is very practical. You put them into the pouches they use at concerts. Pouches are opened at the end of the day. If parents need to reach their kids they can do so easily. Call the school and ask for the kid.
  - woodruffw 3y ago
    Again: the problem was enforcement. It turns out that making 1000+ teenagers put their phones into bags (and ensuring that they don’t open them) is not trivial. The problem with contact is when the student leaves the school: the phone was typically confiscated for multiple days, meaning that students would be left without their phones when they left the grounds. Many parents give their children phones so they can reach them if they’re lost or similar. Notably, the city tore up all of the payphones around the same time. Edit: as a piece of trivia: prior to the end of the ban, there was an entire thriving industry of phone escrow vans parked outside of schools[1]. [1]: https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2012/10/04/phone-valet/1612725/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2012/10/04/phone-valet/1...
    - 3y ago
quattrofan 3y ago
[dead]
terminalcommand 3y ago
I use my phone to check my blood glucose levels. I use a freestyle libre CGM. What will children do who need their phones as a health device?
- Huppie 3y ago
  > Smartphones may still be used if they are needed for class, or if there is a medical need. One example of the latter is if a student with diabetes needs to measure sugar levels.
  - terminalcommand 3y ago
    You are right :). I jumped to the comments section.
- polytely 3y ago
  you can make exceptions, that happens all the time in laws
- dahwolf 3y ago
  They could try reading the article, which addresses this exact scenario.
guy98238710 3y ago
This is so wrong in so many ways. - There's supposed to be a computer in front of every kid since grade one. Schools are instead banning the little computers kids smuggle in. - Hypocrisy. Smartphone bans are pushed by people who use them all the time themselves. - This is the same thing as with corporations locking down employees' computers. It's a policy designed for the worst behaving kids to the detriment of the best behaving ones. Poor use of time and poor self-control become expected and even the best kids will slide towards these low expectations. - Totalitarian policies like this get passed only because teens and tweens are disenfranchised. Democratic government trying to enforce similar population-wide ban wouldn't last long. - It's not about games or social media. Those are actually tolerated far better than apps like Socratic, which are treated like criminal level of cheating. This is technophobia all the way through. I could go on and on about this. Contrary to people nitpicking details (health, parent contact, practicality of enforcement), I think this is fundamentally wrong.
- vc9999 3y ago
  There's supposed to be a computer in front of every kid since grade one. Schools are instead banning the little computers kids smuggle in [A computer to use in the school as a means of education is not the same of letting kids use a cellphone in class] - Hypocrisy. Smartphone bans are pushed by people who use them all the time themselves. [Because they are adults not kids] - This is the same thing as with corporations locking down employees' computers. It's a policy designed for the worst behaving kids to the detriment of the best behaving ones. Poor use of time and poor self-control become expected and even the best kids will slide towards these low expectations. [employees are not kids, also employees are not in school they are in a job] - Totalitarian policies like this get passed only because teens and tweens are disenfranchised. Democratic government trying to enforce similar population-wide ban wouldn't last long. [Totalitarian policies? This has to be a joke] - It's not about games or social media. Those are actually tolerated far better than apps like Socratic, which are treated like criminal level of cheating. This is technophobia all the way through. [Of course. It's not about games and social media, it's a about kids not using a cell phone while in the classroom]
  - 3y ago
steve_adams_86 3y ago
Maybe it’s a symptom of where I live, but many teenagers I know would simply say “try and take it away from me” and wait for enforcement. Very few teachers would engage, and they know that. Teenagers crave and seek out agency. A phone not only provides some of that to them, but resisting having it taken away does as well. It’s a battleground. If students can’t use them, neither should adults.
- snovv_crash 3y ago
  Faraday cage and block all internet in the classroom would make most devices unusable for anything except direct P2P apps like Briar.
  - guy98238710 3y ago
    High-tech enforcement of 19th century teaching styles...
  - EatingWithForks 3y ago
    I think this might work in a country like the Netherlands where school shootings aren't a constant fear and teachers are generally entrusted to ensure safety of children while they're in school. In America I think some parents would freak out because of the potential of the child being unable to reach out to a parent or vice versa during an emergency.
    - unethical_ban 3y ago
      Newsflash: there are mechanisms of communication that utilize wires and can be installed in every room in a building! I submit that any effective jamming or interference of wireless devices could be disabled in an emergency. Of course, if there is a rule, it should be enforceable by teachers. Teacher says no phone? Put the fucking phone away, child.
- ghusto 3y ago
  It's the Netherlands. We don't roll like that ;)
Aerbil313 3y ago
This thread is filled with too much addicted FOMO people defending smarthphones. Turn on Screen Time, delete all social media, block news.ycombinator.com and touch grass.
mmzeeman 3y ago
There are some practical obstacles here. To name one. All high schools in the Netherlands use online schedule and agenda software.
bannedbybros 3y ago
[dead]

340 points by the-dude 3y ago

Every country should have legislation in place that allows this.

Realized 10+ years ago that the only way I could have my kids grow up addiction-free was if they didn't have a smartphone/tablet and the only credible way I could ask this from them was if I also didn't have one. In hindsight one of the best decisions of my life, sadly becoming more and more difficult to maintain as banking, public transportation, restaurants, and all other parts of life increasingly assume you carry a smartphone.

namanyayg 3y ago
Great commitment. What about work tho, do you only work while sitting down in front of your workstation then?
- tokai 3y ago
  >only work while sitting down in front of your workstation As you should no matter if you have a smart phone or not.
- eur0pa 3y ago
  As it should be
- throw_pm23 3y ago
  Not sure which typical workplaces require smartphone use (I'm sure there are many), but indeed, in my case, I work either at the computer or in front of people or walking up and down while thinking :)
  - MattGaiser 3y ago
    I would have thought any using 2FA for anything would essentially require it.
    - derwiki 3y ago
      Yubikey is a good alternative
    - throw_pm23 3y ago
      I haven't yet encountered situations with mandatory 2FA, but indeed, this is the kind of thing I expect to become widespread, making it more and more difficult to those without a smartphone.
      - ghaff 3y ago
        Company TFA is less of a problem than other things as they’ll use a token rather than SMS and you can always use a hardware token. I have a soft token on my phone but it’s not required.
    - arp242 3y ago
      Not really; very few 2FA methods are tied to a specific smartphone app.
    - Semaphor 3y ago
      You can use a YubiKey for 2FA, I think even for TOTP, but as I am a Smartphone user, I use my phone when only TOTP is available.
    - gsich 3y ago
      You can use TOTP on your PC too.
    - vitro 3y ago
      You can have TOTP as a browser extension. Not saying you should, just that there is a possibility. A bonus is easier backup of secrets so loosing your phone does not lock you out.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- tome 3y ago
  > What about work tho, do you only work while sitting down in front of your workstation then? This question is fascinating to me! What form of work requires using a smart phone?
  - achenet 3y ago
    I know some tattoo artists that use their smartphones a lot for discussing ideas with clients, sharing images of their work, etc, via Instagram. Could in theory be done with a camera + computer, but probably easier with smartphone.
  - goodbyesf 3y ago
    Any development work where uptime is important? Especially if SLA is involved. If your product has issues, the client bothers management and management will certainly want to bother you.
  - ghaff 3y ago
    To some degree you can be contactable when traveling or otherwise away from your desk with a feature phone but only partially. You’d certainly be that quirky person with the odd anti-smartphone habit.
  - gspencley 3y ago
    As a software eng something that bothers me is that every single employer that I have worked for has assumed that you would have no problem installing work-related software on your phone. The most common offender is MFA related software. I run GrapheneOS on my phone and don't have the Google Play stuff installed. And kind of the entire point of this is that I don't want to run proprietary, closed-source stuff on my phone at all. I also like not having a ton of bloatware/spyware installed by the manufacturer that I can't remove. So anyway, I usually protest and say that I can't, and that if I'm required to use a mobile device for work purposes then I need the company to provide me with one. Often arrangements can be made by requesting a device that can double for other work related functions. For example, I currently have a work-issued iPad with Okta Verify installed on it that also let's me reach for Safari and do iOS specific dev & testing when needed. But it does show the creep. Companies just assume that they can request that you use your mobile device for things that you otherwise wouldn't, and that you will have no problem complying. IMO saying either "I don't own a smartphone" or "I refuse to use my personal devices for work related purposes" should be a no-questions-asked accepted position. And while I've yet to be met with hostility by saying that, it is unfortunately such a minority position that it is almost always the first time they've heard an objection.
gonehome 3y ago
Lots of respect for this - I’d guess your kids have it too. I often felt frustrated as a kid that adults took power and control over you and didn’t adhere to the same demands themselves.
- kelipso 3y ago
  Seems like contrived logic made by a kid who really wants something. Adults can drive, drink, etc.
  - anjel 3y ago
    Similarly, the emergent generation in American often reject learning to drive a car, as renunciation of the anthropocentric lifestyle.
    - ilyt 3y ago
      I'd imagine it's more coz they can't afford it or have place to store it than anything else
      - bobthepanda 3y ago
        Nah, driving is also stressful and traffic is not fun. I’ve seen recently a fair amount of car enthusiasts start buying into the walkable cities/public transit mantra, because a car enthusiast does not find city/suburban stop and go traffic to be the thing they’re enthusiastic about.
        ilyt 3y ago
        Right but that didn't change in last 20 years. Cities that suck driving (and walking) in now sucked as much and more 20 years ago. It's not that that changed how much people want to have driving license.
        bobthepanda 3y ago
browningstreet 3y ago
My college student still won't take a cell phone. His uni gave him an iPad but he leaves it home most of the time. It can happen. And since he doesn't have a cellphone, I don't pick mine up so much when we're hanging out together. Win-win.
nixpulvis 3y ago
I’m rather disturbed by the discompassion society has towards people without smartphones. Be it menus at restaurants, banking apps (as you mention), or even map availability. We just assume everyone is connected all the time and that phones never break or have issues. I feel crazy, because my phone is constantly misbehaving.
- TotalCrackpot 3y ago
  Industrial society is coercive towards people that want to live more primitive life than one deem normal, that's essentially main thesis of anarcho-primitivists. Still, I don't think Luddites should ban for other people their technology. Why not ban electricity and cars too?
  - xethos 3y ago
    I'm not asking others to give up smartphones, just like I'm not asking others to give up stairs or cars. I only want the world to remain accessible to those without. Keep paper menus, build a ramp, and maintain cycling or public transit infrastructure.
    - TotalCrackpot 3y ago
      Ok, I agree with that. I think there should be more effort put towards infrastructure for people with disabilities too.
- SoftTalker 3y ago
  I think this is overstated. I can't think of anything essential I cannot do without a smartphone or computer. You have to do it like it's 1985, which is foreign to the last generation or two, but it's still doable.
  - logifail 3y ago
    > I can't think of anything essential I cannot do without a smartphone or computer [..] it's still doable Q: Have you never been to a restaurant which has done away with physical menus ("because Covid") and has a QR code which you're supposed to scan with your device?
nologic01 3y ago
> as banking, public transportation, restaurants, and all other parts of life increasingly assume you carry a smartphone People have not worked through the wide ranging implications of this "assumption", given who builds and controls everything about those devices.

chronogram 3y ago

Schools don't already ban them from the classroom?

amelius 3y ago
In France they do. https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexledsom/2019/08/30/the-mobile-phone-ban-in-french-schools-one-year-on-would-it-work-elsewhere/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexledsom/2019/08/30/the-mobil...
bollos 3y ago
They have for a while now in my experience. I'm not sure if it's still a thing, but there used to be these like sacks at the door with numbered pockets in which you'd put your phone until the end of that specific class.
- nerdbert 3y ago
  Based on visiting a lot of Dutch schools this year, that's still very much happening. I tried to google a photo but couldn't figure out what the word for that thing is.
Aachen 3y ago
My Dutch school in the back-end of nowhere (insofar as the country has that) was very progressive with their phone ban in 2006, apparently. Per the article "Schools and teachers have been asking for rules to restrict the use of mobile phones in the classroom" I didn't know that they need permission to enact rules towards an orderly teaching environment. Sounds implausible but what do I know A notable omission from the article is how many schools already have this rule, because I can't imagine that any of them just lets the kids be on their phone during lessons. You're also not allowed to talk while the teacher is explaining something, or aren't allowed to work on homework for another subject or so. So even learning is prohibited if it's not for the right subject you're allocated right now: that's already in place, but banning phones is a problem? Curious
criddell 3y ago
My kids’ high school required kids have a smartphone. They wanted them using the calendar to track tests and assignments, they used the camera quite a bit both for assignments (make a short video about blah blah blah) and for quick notes (take a picture of the homework assignment on the white board). There was a twitter-like app for the teacher to broadcast information to the students and I believe students could message their teacher.

ajsnigrutin 3y ago

I have no idea why this has to be a government-based rule (law? ... assuming they won't fix it until oct. 1st). Although I'm older, and phones were not as common as now, our schools had "school-rules" forbidding the use during classes, and if you got caught with a phone, the teacher would take it, and parents would have to come to school and pick it up. Are schools unable to implement simple rules and need the government to do it now? I'm bothered mostly, because school rules are school rules. Need to adapt? Need some "modification" of the rules? A teacher can do it. If it's government rules, there are pretty sure to be some edge cases, where someone will have to break those rules to achieve something positive.

rvanlaar 3y ago
Here's Arjen Lubach, the Dutch Jon Stewart, about phones in classrooms. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cclEuSxFd_M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cclEuSxFd_M Note: The autogenerated (english) subtitles are a pretty decent.
- Semaphor 3y ago
  Is it possible to get the transcript in English without watching a 13 minute video?
  - 9991 3y ago
    yt-dlp will give it to you.
pbmonster 3y ago
> I have no idea why this has to be a government-based rule You clearly have not met today's parents. Enough of them revolt at the idea of a teacher taking - even temporarily - the $1000 device they bought for their child and which they need to monitor/contact/supervise their child 24/7. A rule like that might help teachers and schools to get overbearing parents off their backs.
- ajsnigrutin 3y ago

INTPenis 3y ago

It should be more specific, they should not be allowed a smartphone in school at all. But a phone, yes definitely. In europe it's a lot more common to send your kids alone to school, so I definitely think they should have a simple phone. But at the same time I want them to go to school without any smartphone, I want them to feel that freedom from social media at least during the school day. Not just that school locks them up, but that they eventually learn to not even bring it.

kergonath 3y ago
> It should be more specific, they should not be allowed a smartphone in school at all. But a phone, yes definitely. In europe it's a lot more common to send your kids alone to school, so I definitely think they should have a simple phone. That’s the usual policy here in France. Smartphones are not allowed at all. Dumb phones are but they can’t be taken out of the bags in the classroom, which makes sense. I am much more comfortable giving my kid a dumb feature phone as well. It’s enough to send text messages and call in an emergency, but it makes him less of a target for mugging.
- balfirevic 3y ago
  > That’s the usual policy here in France. Smartphones are not allowed at all. Do they search the kid's bags?
  - orwin 3y ago
    No, they take it if they see them out, either during class or recess.
  - kergonath 3y ago
    Not without a reason, but suspecting you have a smartphone, or any other forbidden or dangerous item, is one. So in practice you’re fine if you don’t use it, show it, or brag about it.
  - TwistySanta 3y ago
    They searched us without knowledge in the UK. I went to school 2007-2012 so the laws might have changed since then, or this might have been illegal. In PE class one day, we all got changed and left our clothes and bags in the changing room, then while we were on the field doing sport the deputy headteacher went to the changing room and went through everyone's bags and blazers to find phones and valuables. He took them all and made everyone think they had been stolen. He revealed it after five minutes of the class noticing things were missing, and said it was supposed to be a lesson about safety. How theft happens and we shouldn't have valuable items on us at school, and if we do then they should be locked away somewhere secure when we leave our bags somewhere. I doubt that was actually the case, I think he was just trying to get an idea of how many people have smartphones, and who those people were. This was right when they were invented so it was very rare for a kid to have one when I was a first year, but every year more and more kids got them handed down from their parents.

tokai 3y ago

National legislators should stay out of the classrooms. Let parents and the actual experts in teaching at each individual school organize themselves how they see fit. Politicians sadly love hands-on-management of issues instead of focusing on enabling and facilitating actual people controlling their own lives.

thriftwy 3y ago
The whole idea of a school system is that the country government mandates a common denominator of education (including propaganda) to be delivered to all of its children (usually for free). Of course it may be more granular than the whole country, but schools organizing themselves as they see fit is an exception.
eimrine 3y ago
> Let parents and the actual experts in teaching at each individual school organize themselves how they see fit. Parents seems to be extra in this statement. Decent parents can be evil and/or letting their kids too much, but a decent teacher can not.

Thrio499 3y ago

Smartphone is essential tool for normal life today. One can not even pay or use public transport without smartphone! Owning it should be basic human right, like wearing clothes! Large number of students in Nederlands do not speak local language. Smartphone is essential for translation and communication with them. It also allows calling 911, and video/audio recording evidence, if there are any misunderstandings. This rule feels like teachers are solving their problems at expense of students!

CalRobert 3y ago
I'm a parent. We're moving to the Netherlands next month. I just sent emails to the local taalschool in Hilversum (and two basisschools) to ensure that my daughters learn Dutch as fast as possible upon our arrival because learning the local language is critical for living a full life. Any parent who doesn't do this, except _perhaps_ for those who know they're on a short-term stint for work or similar, is being negligent.
- bollos 3y ago
  Small correction that it would be "basisscholen" in the plural form. I hope you enjoy your stay here in NL :)
  - CalRobert 3y ago
    Dank u wel! Hopefully within a year my daughter is helping me get details like that correct :-)
- Thrio499 3y ago
  There are people who do not want to learn Dutch. I sincerely wish all best to you and your kid. Please stay on her side, and not on side of some imagininary ideology.
misnome 3y ago
This feels like you didn’t even read the thread title. “In Classroom” != “they are banned from owning”. And I’m not sure that calling 911 would help them, in the Netherlands.

msla 3y ago

This is very, very dangerous, especially if an emergency happens and the teacher is out of the room or slow to respond. Yes, emergencies happened before cell phones. People died of them more often back then.

code_runner 3y ago
So interested in seeing some sources for “tragedies at schools causing death preventable by smartphone access during instruction”
misnome 3y ago
This reads like pure hysteria. Do you have any evidence or statistics about rates of “Classroom Emergencies” to base this panic on? Specifically those outside of the US, we know that is an outlier.
- msla 3y ago
  Can you do this without bringing a completely unrelated country into it? The United States of America isn't the main character of history.
  - bscphil 3y ago
    That the US should not be the focal point of an argument about phones in schools is exactly the point that the parent comment was making.
    - msla 3y ago
      I never brought up the US.
  - michaelt 3y ago
    What misnome means is: Don't criticise this Dutch school rule if you can only do so using American school shooting statistics.

everybodyknows 3y ago

> Children will soon be prevented from bringing mobile phones into Dutch classrooms. "Prevent"? Forbidding is easy. Actually preventing is another thing altogether. > Due to persistent signals from teachers that they are unable to keep smartphones out of the classroom on their own, ... So teachers already had the authority to forbid carrying of phones. Article offers no evidence that national authorities can do any better.

tmpz22 3y ago
Enforcement is a challenge but by making it a law you hopefully also co-opt parents to help with enforcement.
- Aerroon 3y ago
  Alternatively it will teach children at a younger age to ignore laws.
  - esarbe 3y ago
    Or getting their phone confiscated and not being able to use it for a week or so will teach them the cost of ignoring laws. A useful life lesson in any case.
    - Aerroon 3y ago
      Sure, but if that happens how do you think they will feel about the teacher that did that? Do you think that kid will see eye to eye with the teacher after that?
      - esarbe 3y ago
        That's a very silly question. "No phones in school" is no different from any other rule the teachers have to enforce in class. Let's try the same question, with another rule, to make the point; "Imagine a teacher stops some kids from beating up another kid; if that happens how do you think they will feel about the teacher that did that? Do you think that kid will see eye to eye with the teacher after that?" At some point there will be a need to set boundaries. That's the essence of socialization and necessarily a part of education. Teachers will have to set boundaries and enforce rules, that doesn't have anything to do with phones.

Rechtsstaat 3y ago

This is an older article. Today, the coalition decided on a measure with 'urgent advice' to not be allowed smartphones, tablets and smartwatches in the classroom [1]. Starting Jan 1st 2024, and so far only for secondary education, though they're deciding on primary education today.Schools are free in how they implement it, could be in the entire building or just classrooms. I don't expect any hard rules any time soon, with the coalition being so divided on the topic. There's been interesting debates in parlement preceding this measure, with several interesting position papers on the topic from researchers, and even student associations [2]. The researchers emphasize that adolescents are much more susceptible to the bad effects of smartphones, due to inexperience with dopamine and its effects on dopamine production, being easier to condition, FOMO. The main adverse effect they name is what they call a 'crumbling brain', with a short attention span unable to focus on one thing for a longer time. An often-repeated soundbyte is that students using smartphones often score in average 1-1.5 points less on tests, on a scale of 1 to 10. I dunno what to think about it. As noted by the student association, it seems like children won't get the chance to learn how to handle the traps smartphones pose. Then again, I was free to use mine in high school and I'm still addicted to the thing :/ [1] https://nos.nl/artikel/2481424-kabinet-geeft-dringend-advies-aan-scholen-telefoon-uit-de-klas https://nos.nl/artikel/2481424-kabinet-geeft-dringend-advies... [2] https://www.tweedekamer.nl/debat_en_vergadering/commissievergaderingen/details?id=2023A01131 https://www.tweedekamer.nl/debat_en_vergadering/commissiever...

ctenb 3y ago
The article says it's published at TUESDAY, 4 JULY 2023 - 14:26. Strange that its information is apparently outdated.
- boredpudding 3y ago
  It's because 'nltimes.nl' is not a serious news outlet. It just translates things and reposts it.
  - ciropantera 3y ago
    I don’t know if this is the case, but I’ve noticed questionable news outlets reposting their own old articles, possibly to game google news search or something

LatteLazy 3y ago

Its sort of crazy that if I said we should ban computers or landline telephones or the internet from schools I'd be pilloried as a luddite. But everyone cheers banning smartphones. Because they are convinced (without evidence) that they are addictive. And of course, the best way to teach kids about addictive things is to give them zero exposure to them until they turn 18 (21 etc) then give them full, limitless, unsupervised access...

maccard 3y ago
Smartphones are being banned because they _are_ pocket computers. They're not being banned because they're phones. They're major distractions
phito 3y ago
No evidence that phones are addictive? Are you kidding me?
- LatteLazy 3y ago
  It's the same evidence that video games cause violence: no evidence, but the worried well really WANT to believe it, and somehow everyone just convinces themselves it is true. To be clear, I am not saying kids SHOULD be on their phones in school or that no one has a bad relationship with their phone. Just that no one has actually bothered measuring this, they jumped straight to "it suits my prejudices so I believe it"...
dahwolf 3y ago
Where did you learn to dramatize like this? Smartphone?

CalRobert 3y ago

Between this and my kids actually being able to ride a bike around without getting mowed down by drivers I'm ecstatic to be moving there next month.

chrismartin 3y ago
To the extent you're willing to share, I'm curious what's bringing you there, and where you're moving from.
- CalRobert 3y ago
  This is the gist of it: https://youtu.be/oHlpmxLTxpw https://youtu.be/oHlpmxLTxpw But I grew up in central California and surroundings in the 90's and rode my bike everywhere. And it was horrible. I nearly died multiple times, and drivers were sometimes furious at someone biking on the road. I rode from Sac to Folsom once over a narrow bridge with no shoulder and can't believe I lived. I thought it might be better in cities, but Berkeley, while better, was still mediocre, and Santa Monica was bad. Really, everywhere in the US is somewhere on the spectrum from "merely horrible" to "dire hellscape". Ten years ago my wife and I moved to Ireland. Ireland is also bad, but still massively better than anywhere I've lived in the US. But now we have young kids, and we don't want "better than the US", we want "good enough your child can bike to school, and when people kill children with their cars the people are angry with the driver, not sympathetic towards them". Which means the Netherlands, or perhaps Denmark. So that's where we're going. Ireland being wildly incompetent bureaucratically it took 4 years just to process mine and my wife's naturalisation applications.
  - ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
    I grew up riding bikes every damned day (including to and from school) in the Chicago suburbs and don't recall ever having an incident with a car. I also didn't tend to ride in busy streets. Teach your kids how to survive.
    - jackson1442 3y ago

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rootusrootus 3y ago

I have to imagine this is already pretty common. Here in the US, my kids' schools are pretty restrictive on smartphones. At least through middle school, they'll confiscate it if you take it out during class or it rings. The elementary schools of course don't allow them at all on campus, though they're kind of okay with the cellular apple watch as long as the kid doesn't use it during class.

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eimrine 3y ago

This law is so good, almost perfect. The only thing that is missing is a segregation between FOSS and anything else. Computers w/ FOSS should be not only allowed but being a primary source of learning but proprietary software should be banned at schools.

bigbacaloa 3y ago

Every generation has trouble dealing with the changes in the younger generation. Imposing luddite behavior us just dumb. I speak as a father of teenagers. Better they learn responsible use than have it imposed.

alexawarrior 3y ago
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cies 3y ago
> Better they learn responsible use than have it imposed. Good that schools do not have to learn responsible use, or unlearn irresponsible use, by just banning it whole sale. You have the rest of their waking hours to do so (or not do so) as a parent.
dahwolf 3y ago
It's not dumb. The phone distracts from the goal, it's as simple as that.
- strus 3y ago
  > The phone distracts from the goa So does life. I think we should lock the children in school from the beginning of the education period, without the access to the external, disctracting life. They can leave when they are 18.

darkclouds 3y ago

And just how do you capture teachers breaking the law at school? I've seen teachers hitting kids with metre long wooden rules around ankles, a teacher throwing a kid into some music stands and reportedly out of a window, and much more. Seeing is believing but authority figures in all walks of life abuse their positions because they are only human!

kwhitefoot 3y ago
Which country was that in?
- darkclouds 3y ago
  The UK. Where else did inspiration for Pink Floyds The Wall come from? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wall#Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wall#Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Happiest_Days_of_Our_Lives#Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Happiest_Days_of_Our_Lives... ""The Happiest Days of Our Lives" concerns Pink's youth, attending a school run by strict and often violent teachers who treat the pupils with contempt." You dont run an Empire by being nice!
finikytou 3y ago
just educate your children to have values. they will tell the truth. how do you think mankind did it before the phone.
- abfan1127 3y ago
  given the reduction in both actual police violence and police brutality reports once body cams were introduced, I suspect mankind did a lot of lying before smart phones.
  - finikytou 3y ago
    I really hope you never hold any power. I recommend you a nice movie you can watch called videodrome.

cies 3y ago

Choosing children's mental health and focus on school work over allowing big biz to unload their addictive products upon us. Seems to be the good thing to do.

mschuster91 3y ago

What a load of short-sighted nonsense. Instead of revising curricula to be actually attractive and modernizing teaching instead of a drone blathering at the front of the classroom, ban phones. The problem at the core is that education has ossified. A toxic combination of parents unable to accept that their children can have a better school experience than they had ("we had to hike two hours even during storms to go to school, stop complaining!!!"), privileged parents wanting to keep classist privileges for their children (this is a huge problem here in Germany where we separate between useless Hauptschule, just as useless Realschule and Gymnasium after 4th/6th year), politicians intimidated by the huge influence the well-networked classist parents have, underpaid staff and underfunded schools, burnt-out teachers who long since have given up on changing anything because of the lack of time, funds, respect for their work and backing by superiors...

wunderland 3y ago
Alternatively, this has nothing to do with an outdated curriculum and is about removing a distraction that impacts learning of anything!
- mschuster91 3y ago
  If kids rather want their phones than to listen to school, maybe it's time to change how school works. 30 kids having to sit still 6 hours a day and do nothing more than listen and take notes? That's boring as fuck. Even worse as a lot of the stuff they learn is something they'll literally never even think about once in their life and they'll have to forget again after the test to make room for more useless crap. And every attempt to innovate gets shot down somewhere, so the teachers aren't really willing to adapt either - when I went to school a decade ago we had more than one teacher who used the same transparent sheets on an overhead projector that he made (and copied) decades ago, written on a typewriter. Smaller class sizes, more teachers, interactive and engaging lessons... that's all stuff that only the private schools (Waldorf and friends) provide and it actually works out even with conventional metrics, but these are expensive and have issues on their own (e.g. the tendency to attract pedos and weirdos, of which there have been a fair share of scandals). Yes, I'm fed up with the sorry state of our education system.

xeromal 3y ago

This should go over as about as well as other abstinence-type programs.

bannedbybros 3y ago

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woudsma 3y ago

I can't imagine myself graduating high school if I had a smartphone back then. Those things are so addictive, they just keep on giving. When I was studying all you could play on your phone was Snake. Going out with friends and making a campfire was way more fun than playing Snake. Nowadays people can spend 14hrs a day on their phone and still not be bored, it's crazy. Deleting social media apps makes your phone _much_ less interesting though!

bluescrn 3y ago
Also, entire new forms of bullying, endless porn, and clickbait media with headlines that can be terrifying to adults, let alone kids.
earthling8118 3y ago
This is a sign of you being out of touch with the times. I can assure you that a phone wouldn't be the source of this problem. I would play Kerbal Space Program or any other game on the school computer. There weren't many options for them to stop it. We had http proxies, linux live CDs, you name it. The schools just simply couldn't lock them down properly. Even the students that weren't technically inclined didn't have difficulty, but there were plenty of people that did know what they were doing too.
- qup 3y ago
  If you were playing KSP on your school computers, then you're just part of the current generation. We're old, kiddo. I was playing Oregon Trail.
  - kalupa 3y ago
    I'd say both are educational and being played on a school computer is acceptable
    - qup 3y ago
      Yes, and I would argue that when we were hacking school computer lab macs to play world of warcraft 3, in my later years, that was okay, too. School IT admins are assholes for no reason.

TotalCrackpot 3y ago

I fact-checked a lot of wrong information that my teachers were spewing by using the smartphone, I think this ban is bad. This should be a choice. These days even reading books can be more comfortable on a screen, and it is easier to have bigger catalogue (piracy cough cough). School is a horrible, authoritarian structure comparable to prison and mental ward already, there is no reason to make it more fucked up.

binarymax 3y ago
What stops you from fact checking after you get out of the school? I’m trying to understand how a child having a distracting and addicting smartphone is a good solution to the occasional misinformed teacher.
- Aerroon 3y ago
  >What stops you from fact checking after you get out of the school? First, you will forget about all the bs they mentioned. Second, you can't confront the teacher over it or to ask them to clarify in a way that other kids will hear it too.
  - esarbe 3y ago
    You can always make notes, check later and then confront the teacher the next time you have class. Still not a reason for a kid t have a smartphone in school.
    - TotalCrackpot 3y ago
      There is one very simple reason. Fuck authoritarianism, especially when education is mandatory. Consider that a lot of people have public schooling with atrocious quality that is quite frankly quite useless, because it is mostly nationalistic, xenophobic, white-supremacists, elitist, classist, patriarchal etc. propaganda. It is actually not even useless a lot of the time, it is just harmful to a person to listen to these lies, so it's actually better if kids can drown out this propaganda by looking at a smartphone screen.

loeg 3y ago

I think this is probably a good thing. Even in the early 2000s, having phones in the classroom was mostly a distraction (texting, or having the ringer on and distracting others) or vehicle for cheating (also texting in those days). The only downside is in emergency situations where children should have some agency to contact family. If children could be trusted to turn their phones off at the start of class and leave them in their bags, that would be great, but I get the impression from teachers that that isn't the case.

tomsmeding 3y ago

Bad source, no sources are cited in the article. Dutch sources [1] [2] (reputable newspapers, both articles published today) mostly agree with this article, but the starting date is wrong. Schools will now start discussing how to implement such measures; the rule starts being in force starting January 1st, 2024. Even then there will not be a law yet, though a law may come, depending on cooperation from schools and I guess political climate. There is no mention of anything happening on October 1st. Now if NLTimes would have given us their sources, we might have known where they got that from. [1]: https://nos.nl/artikel/2481424-kabinet-geeft-dringend-advies-aan-scholen-telefoon-uit-de-klas https://nos.nl/artikel/2481424-kabinet-geeft-dringend-advies... [2]: https://www.ad.nl/politiek/mobieltje-in-de-klas-in-de-ban-ouders-staan-straks-niet-meer-alleen~a56c48a2/ https://www.ad.nl/politiek/mobieltje-in-de-klas-in-de-ban-ou...

zdragnar 3y ago
I remember when cell phones first started becoming a thing parents would get for their kids, especially those who took school trips for sports or debate etc. Even though this was pre-smartphone days, our school had a strict policy of no phones outside of lockers during the school day. If you were caught with one in a classroom, it was taken away and sent to the principal's office, where you would have to get it at the end of the day (typically after a stern talking to). What changed that teachers started letting kids have phones in classrooms? It is utterly mind boggling to me that it was ever allowed in the first place. Edit: To clarify, I'm in the US and phones in classrooms seem to be a common complaint among teachers. Something seems to have changed, just not sure what.

woodruffw 3y ago

NYC had a similar ban until 2015[1]. The problem was always enforcement: you can "prevent" students from having phones, but this means nothing unless (1) you're actively preventing them from bringing them onto schoolgrounds, and (2) taking phones away from students who do bring them into school. Part of why NYC lifted their ban was because neither (1) nor (2) was practical: schools ended up adopting an "out of sight, out of mind" policy around phones, and actual confiscations led to larger concerns (e.g., students who were unable to contact their caretakers after school). It will be interesting to see if the Dutch can overcome either (or both) of these problems. [1]: https://www.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/013-15/mayor-de-blasio-chancellor-fari-a-lift-school-cell-phone-ban https://www.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/013-15/mayor-de...

light_hue_1 3y ago
That's incredibly short sighted and disappointing. There is no place for cellphones in school. They're incredibly disruptive to classes and learning. Banning cellphones in schools is very practical. You put them into the pouches they use at concerts. Pouches are opened at the end of the day. If parents need to reach their kids they can do so easily. Call the school and ask for the kid.
- woodruffw 3y ago
  Again: the problem was enforcement. It turns out that making 1000+ teenagers put their phones into bags (and ensuring that they don’t open them) is not trivial. The problem with contact is when the student leaves the school: the phone was typically confiscated for multiple days, meaning that students would be left without their phones when they left the grounds. Many parents give their children phones so they can reach them if they’re lost or similar. Notably, the city tore up all of the payphones around the same time. Edit: as a piece of trivia: prior to the end of the ban, there was an entire thriving industry of phone escrow vans parked outside of schools[1]. [1]: https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2012/10/04/phone-valet/1612725/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2012/10/04/phone-valet/1...
  - 3y ago

quattrofan 3y ago

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terminalcommand 3y ago

I use my phone to check my blood glucose levels. I use a freestyle libre CGM. What will children do who need their phones as a health device?

Huppie 3y ago
> Smartphones may still be used if they are needed for class, or if there is a medical need. One example of the latter is if a student with diabetes needs to measure sugar levels.
- terminalcommand 3y ago
  You are right :). I jumped to the comments section.
polytely 3y ago
you can make exceptions, that happens all the time in laws
dahwolf 3y ago
They could try reading the article, which addresses this exact scenario.

guy98238710 3y ago

This is so wrong in so many ways. - There's supposed to be a computer in front of every kid since grade one. Schools are instead banning the little computers kids smuggle in. - Hypocrisy. Smartphone bans are pushed by people who use them all the time themselves. - This is the same thing as with corporations locking down employees' computers. It's a policy designed for the worst behaving kids to the detriment of the best behaving ones. Poor use of time and poor self-control become expected and even the best kids will slide towards these low expectations. - Totalitarian policies like this get passed only because teens and tweens are disenfranchised. Democratic government trying to enforce similar population-wide ban wouldn't last long. - It's not about games or social media. Those are actually tolerated far better than apps like Socratic, which are treated like criminal level of cheating. This is technophobia all the way through. I could go on and on about this. Contrary to people nitpicking details (health, parent contact, practicality of enforcement), I think this is fundamentally wrong.

vc9999 3y ago
There's supposed to be a computer in front of every kid since grade one. Schools are instead banning the little computers kids smuggle in [A computer to use in the school as a means of education is not the same of letting kids use a cellphone in class] - Hypocrisy. Smartphone bans are pushed by people who use them all the time themselves. [Because they are adults not kids] - This is the same thing as with corporations locking down employees' computers. It's a policy designed for the worst behaving kids to the detriment of the best behaving ones. Poor use of time and poor self-control become expected and even the best kids will slide towards these low expectations. [employees are not kids, also employees are not in school they are in a job] - Totalitarian policies like this get passed only because teens and tweens are disenfranchised. Democratic government trying to enforce similar population-wide ban wouldn't last long. [Totalitarian policies? This has to be a joke] - It's not about games or social media. Those are actually tolerated far better than apps like Socratic, which are treated like criminal level of cheating. This is technophobia all the way through. [Of course. It's not about games and social media, it's a about kids not using a cell phone while in the classroom]
- 3y ago

steve_adams_86 3y ago

Maybe it’s a symptom of where I live, but many teenagers I know would simply say “try and take it away from me” and wait for enforcement. Very few teachers would engage, and they know that. Teenagers crave and seek out agency. A phone not only provides some of that to them, but resisting having it taken away does as well. It’s a battleground. If students can’t use them, neither should adults.

snovv_crash 3y ago
Faraday cage and block all internet in the classroom would make most devices unusable for anything except direct P2P apps like Briar.
- guy98238710 3y ago
  High-tech enforcement of 19th century teaching styles...
- EatingWithForks 3y ago
  I think this might work in a country like the Netherlands where school shootings aren't a constant fear and teachers are generally entrusted to ensure safety of children while they're in school. In America I think some parents would freak out because of the potential of the child being unable to reach out to a parent or vice versa during an emergency.
  - unethical_ban 3y ago
    Newsflash: there are mechanisms of communication that utilize wires and can be installed in every room in a building! I submit that any effective jamming or interference of wireless devices could be disabled in an emergency. Of course, if there is a rule, it should be enforceable by teachers. Teacher says no phone? Put the fucking phone away, child.
ghusto 3y ago
It's the Netherlands. We don't roll like that ;)

Aerbil313 3y ago

This thread is filled with too much addicted FOMO people defending smarthphones. Turn on Screen Time, delete all social media, block news.ycombinator.com and touch grass.

mmzeeman 3y ago

There are some practical obstacles here. To name one. All high schools in the Netherlands use online schedule and agenda software.

bannedbybros 3y ago

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