5 ms·

Around here, unfortunately yes. The general argument I've heard is that kids need to be able to contact parents in an emergency, or something.

boeingUH60 3y ago
There should be a public phone (manned by an administrator or teacher) that parents can call and get connected to their child or vice versa. Allowing smartphones for everyone is an unbelievable distraction.
- vwcx 3y ago
  Most schools have maintained this for the past 40+ years.
- gremlinsinc 3y ago
  With the rise in school shootings (I graduated in 98, Columbine was for me the first, and one of the deadliest obviously, but ever since it's just escalated).. I've got two boys 4 and 6, they don't have cellphones now, but I freak and feel I need to do damage control/therapy with them everytime they have an active shooter drill. We only ever had to deal with Tornado, and Fire drills. ADHD tangent aside my point is: I can see the need these days, however I like the idea of a dumb phone that just has the basics. Definitely no tiktok, facebook, etc.
  - boeingUH60 3y ago
    To be honest, I think your fear is overblown, but I understand how it is having kids you love. But let's assume a rare mass shooting actually happens (I forbid this thought)...will there be any point calling your kids? A phone will be more of a liability than an asset at that point..
    - wharvle 3y ago
      The fear of harm from shooter drills that the parent expressed is, sadly, not overblown. That we have so many school shootings is shameful. That we've decided a good reaction to them is to traumatize huge numbers of students (and staff! My former-teacher wife has stories...) over something that's, as shameful as the cases of it are, in fact extremely unlikely (specifically, an indiscriminate mass shooting at a primary or secondary school) is also shameful.
dataflow 3y ago
It's amazing how these arguments come about. Were parents freaking out about emergencies at school when they were kids?
- ghaff 3y ago
  A lot of people have become very adept at conjuring up edge cases for why being out of instant communication is just not acceptable any longer. I am somewhat sympathetic to arguments that lots of things we took for granted growing up really are not especially acceptable today but there are limits.
- zeta0134 3y ago
  During every school I attended growing up (and I graduated in 2007 so this isn't that ancient history) my parents would just call the school office if something urgent came up, and the faculty would use the intercom system to page the room I was in. The teacher paused their lesson, acknowledged the request, and asked me to pack my things and head up to the front office, no questions asked. It was infrequent, but very well understood and executed efficiently. I'm not sure smartphones have improved on this? If a kid gets a call in class the teacher's almost immediate reaction is annoyance, because there was no chain of authority that led to that distracting element. Now the kid's on the defensive and has to explain that it's their parent, and the whole class gets to wait while the kid awkwardly has this conversation while simultaneously communicating with the teacher that it's a legitimate request, etc. And that's for legitimate emergencies, to say nothing of the troublemakers that will intentionally coordinate fake calls to get out of class and hang out with their friends.
  - dataflow 3y ago
    Agree with you, but also, I feel like my imagination is lacking here. What kinds of "emergencies" even exist that require a child to resolve them? In all my K-12 education I feel like I think my parents only needed to contact me in class without prior arrangement maybe... once? Or twice? Zero times? Honestly I can't think of a single instance, I'm just assuming there must've been one I've forgotten about, certainly not an "emergency". Even other students being called from class seemed incredibly rare, and even in those cases I would have just assumed things were prearranged and they merely got a notification that the parent had come to pick them up, or something.
egeozcan 3y ago
It's as if the school doesn't have any phones they could use in an emergency.
- dylan604 3y ago
  An emergency like active shooter, not your child had an accident. During active shooter situations, the school isn't going to call the parents of the students. They have other things to worry about. The kids are calling their parents directly.
  - M95D 3y ago
    Imagine a kid hiding from a shooter and having his phone ring 'cause his parent is concerned.
  - amanaplanacanal 3y ago
    I’m trying to figure out what useful action the parent is going to take in this situation.
    - jrs235 3y ago
      They sometimes make things worse by showing and causing problems/disruptions for those trying to get control of the situation.
      - dylan604 3y ago
        true, but if the police are standing around because they're too scarred, then parents giving them the what for is justified
    - stvltvs 3y ago
      Prents want to hear from their children if - as they imagine the scenario - their child is about to die.
  - boeingUH60 3y ago
    > The kids are calling their parents directly. To do what? Come save them Delta Force style? If such an unfortunate thing happens, the kids are dependent on law enforcement, not parents, for safety.
wharvle 3y ago
School shootings come up a lot in these kinds of conversations. Of course you can run the numbers and realize this plainly falls way below the level at which anyone should be using that use-case as a justification for anything. (nb. the vast majority of school shootings you'll see in the statistics aren't the sort where kids having phones matters, they're e.g. targeted attacks on a single person, gang- or otherwise crime-related targeted attacks, violence that just by happenstance takes place on school grounds outside and perhaps not even involving any students or staff; all of which tend to be over almost as fast as they start and aren't an ongoing threat to bystanders once they're over, and even those aren't terribly likely to be something a kid is present for during their school career, on average)
- teloli 3y ago
  Oh boy am I glad to live in a first world country where this is not an issue.
  - wharvle 3y ago
    To be clear, it's bullshit these are even remotely a real thing we have to worry about in a rich OECD state. ... to be more clear, if you run the numbers, they're still kinda not. Our reaction(s) to them aren't rational (though, one can understand why)

boeingUH60 3y ago

There should be a public phone (manned by an administrator or teacher) that parents can call and get connected to their child or vice versa. Allowing smartphones for everyone is an unbelievable distraction.

vwcx 3y ago
Most schools have maintained this for the past 40+ years.
gremlinsinc 3y ago
With the rise in school shootings (I graduated in 98, Columbine was for me the first, and one of the deadliest obviously, but ever since it's just escalated).. I've got two boys 4 and 6, they don't have cellphones now, but I freak and feel I need to do damage control/therapy with them everytime they have an active shooter drill. We only ever had to deal with Tornado, and Fire drills. ADHD tangent aside my point is: I can see the need these days, however I like the idea of a dumb phone that just has the basics. Definitely no tiktok, facebook, etc.
- boeingUH60 3y ago
  To be honest, I think your fear is overblown, but I understand how it is having kids you love. But let's assume a rare mass shooting actually happens (I forbid this thought)...will there be any point calling your kids? A phone will be more of a liability than an asset at that point..
  - wharvle 3y ago
    The fear of harm from shooter drills that the parent expressed is, sadly, not overblown. That we have so many school shootings is shameful. That we've decided a good reaction to them is to traumatize huge numbers of students (and staff! My former-teacher wife has stories...) over something that's, as shameful as the cases of it are, in fact extremely unlikely (specifically, an indiscriminate mass shooting at a primary or secondary school) is also shameful.

dataflow 3y ago

It's amazing how these arguments come about. Were parents freaking out about emergencies at school when they were kids?

ghaff 3y ago
A lot of people have become very adept at conjuring up edge cases for why being out of instant communication is just not acceptable any longer. I am somewhat sympathetic to arguments that lots of things we took for granted growing up really are not especially acceptable today but there are limits.
zeta0134 3y ago
During every school I attended growing up (and I graduated in 2007 so this isn't that ancient history) my parents would just call the school office if something urgent came up, and the faculty would use the intercom system to page the room I was in. The teacher paused their lesson, acknowledged the request, and asked me to pack my things and head up to the front office, no questions asked. It was infrequent, but very well understood and executed efficiently. I'm not sure smartphones have improved on this? If a kid gets a call in class the teacher's almost immediate reaction is annoyance, because there was no chain of authority that led to that distracting element. Now the kid's on the defensive and has to explain that it's their parent, and the whole class gets to wait while the kid awkwardly has this conversation while simultaneously communicating with the teacher that it's a legitimate request, etc. And that's for legitimate emergencies, to say nothing of the troublemakers that will intentionally coordinate fake calls to get out of class and hang out with their friends.
- dataflow 3y ago
  Agree with you, but also, I feel like my imagination is lacking here. What kinds of "emergencies" even exist that require a child to resolve them? In all my K-12 education I feel like I think my parents only needed to contact me in class without prior arrangement maybe... once? Or twice? Zero times? Honestly I can't think of a single instance, I'm just assuming there must've been one I've forgotten about, certainly not an "emergency". Even other students being called from class seemed incredibly rare, and even in those cases I would have just assumed things were prearranged and they merely got a notification that the parent had come to pick them up, or something.

egeozcan 3y ago

It's as if the school doesn't have any phones they could use in an emergency.

dylan604 3y ago
An emergency like active shooter, not your child had an accident. During active shooter situations, the school isn't going to call the parents of the students. They have other things to worry about. The kids are calling their parents directly.
- M95D 3y ago
  Imagine a kid hiding from a shooter and having his phone ring 'cause his parent is concerned.
- amanaplanacanal 3y ago
  I’m trying to figure out what useful action the parent is going to take in this situation.
  - jrs235 3y ago
    They sometimes make things worse by showing and causing problems/disruptions for those trying to get control of the situation.
    - dylan604 3y ago
      true, but if the police are standing around because they're too scarred, then parents giving them the what for is justified
  - stvltvs 3y ago
    Prents want to hear from their children if - as they imagine the scenario - their child is about to die.
- boeingUH60 3y ago
  > The kids are calling their parents directly. To do what? Come save them Delta Force style? If such an unfortunate thing happens, the kids are dependent on law enforcement, not parents, for safety.

wharvle 3y ago

School shootings come up a lot in these kinds of conversations. Of course you can run the numbers and realize this plainly falls way below the level at which anyone should be using that use-case as a justification for anything. (nb. the vast majority of school shootings you'll see in the statistics aren't the sort where kids having phones matters, they're e.g. targeted attacks on a single person, gang- or otherwise crime-related targeted attacks, violence that just by happenstance takes place on school grounds outside and perhaps not even involving any students or staff; all of which tend to be over almost as fast as they start and aren't an ongoing threat to bystanders once they're over, and even those aren't terribly likely to be something a kid is present for during their school career, on average)

teloli 3y ago
Oh boy am I glad to live in a first world country where this is not an issue.
- wharvle 3y ago
  To be clear, it's bullshit these are even remotely a real thing we have to worry about in a rich OECD state. ... to be more clear, if you run the numbers, they're still kinda not. Our reaction(s) to them aren't rational (though, one can understand why)