5 ms·

My kid's school got a lot of press for a smartphone ban. To be clear you could still have a phone, it was just taken if anyone saw it during school hours. If

by duxup 2y ago

My kid's school got a lot of press for a smartphone ban. To be clear you could still have a phone, it was just taken if anyone saw it during school hours. If you got caught 3 times your parents had to come retrieve it ... that last part did wonders. I don't know how the sleep part plays into it, my oldest of course wants his phone with him at all times (he is required to put it away before bedtime). I wonder if the school's ban encouraged parents to set similar restrictions?

jonhohle 2y ago
Our school has similar restriction, but then shoved Chromebooks in front of every kid and they use chat instead of text, watch videos, and play games all through class instead. When I’ve tried to find alternatives for my more distractible kids, the school acts like we’re putting them out. What is the point of a cell phone ban when it’s just replaced with a more capable device?
- dylan604 2y ago
  If a school doesn’t have an IT policy of blocking YouTube and socials, then they are just inept. If the school is buying instructional material that requires that, then they are inept. If an instructional company is making anything requiring any of that, they are inept.
  - rob_c 2y ago
    Yeah but most IT graduates working in a UK school on that salary are beyond inept in all honesty which is why do y many kids are able to find ways around the tills they use...
    - sahmeepee 2y ago
      That is quite an offensive and uninformed comment. I worked in that sector a long time ago and your hipshot is very far from my lived experience. If you want to educate yourself in what the large community of typically very dedicated IT workers in UK schools do to protect children from online harm, search for edugeek and take a look through their "filtering" related forum. Back when I did that kind of work the web filtering tools were stil mostly commercial, e.g. Websense, and we maintained reasonably good control, but it was a cat and mouse effort. As just one example, for blocking games it wasn't enough just to block all game websites (new ones every day) and all "proxy" sites as they were known (new ones every hour), you'd also have to block things the kids brought in. At one point we wrote a script that scanned files to find all Excel documents with Flash games embedded within them via an activex component and nuke them. This is all against the backdrop of maintaining an incredibly diverse IT setup where commercial software often had utterly appalling requirements but was mandated from on high. I now work in an organisation with >£1bn turnover and it probably has fewer licensed software packages than just one secondary school I used to work for. What you realise over time is that the technical tools are not really the solution. Classroom teachers need to use their skills to keep children on task. Schools need to use their existing disciplinary protocols when children don't follow the agreed rules. IT staff need to provide a baseline level of safety to ensure that no child can accidentally or casually break the IT rules.
      - jonhohle 2y ago
        You know how you get it right? Either on prem, offline everything, or explicit allow lists controlled by teachers for that specific period. Disable USB ports. That’s what we moved to for one of our kids who couldn’t handle it. Except we have to control the access because the school won’t. It works. Is it perfect? No. Google Docs is the worst due to embedding. But it beats whack-a-mole. I’ve now had to do the management job of six teachers because they apparently don’t have the skill to deal with 30 kids with Swiss cheese restrictions. This, despite significant investments in software.
        rob_c 2y ago
        I salute getting it right and not getting in a huff. Some of the best sysadmins I've met are around academia because of the culture and they don't explode when being told their peers need to do better.
      - rob_c 2y ago
        I guarantee you that this is not an uninformed comment. Exactly the opposite. All I'll tell you is: a) you're failing at stopping malicious internal actors you're simply fixing tick boxes b) most school networks are a complete nightmare or worse laughable with next to no separation of resources (marking a drive as hidden on windows isn't secure) c) maintaining an adult block isn't something to be proud of, there's services that do that for free at the perimeter they're called firewalls, deploy and forget, if that's not the case you are doing it wrong. d) oh fudjing wow you wrote a script. This makes you a l33t sysadmin among your peers... Try taking to someone who deploys Linux at scale, this is Tuesday morning to them. Stop blaming the teachers, and while we're at it, train them to not get fished by the smart kids...
  - jonhohle 2y ago
    If they’d train on my child’s search and browser history, they’d probably close most holes within minutes of them being known. smh
- arrowsmith 2y ago
  If my child’s school had them playing games on Chromebooks all class, I would move them to a different school.
  - rob_c 2y ago
    In Scotland it's iPads paid for by London so move them there at least :p
- duxup 2y ago
  At least for my kids their Chromebook traffic is all routed through the school (or the school's filter provider...) and through a web filter. It is updated regularly, presumably by the filter provider.
arrowsmith 2y ago
This was the policy at my school ~20 years ago. “Smartphones” didn’t exist, but mobile phones were ubiquitous and every kid owned one. But they weren’t allowed in the classroom, and if you were found to have one in the classroom (even if it was switched off in your pocket), it would immediately be confiscated and you wouldn’t get it back until at least the next day. Why would any school not have this policy? What possible reason is there to allow phones in the classroom? How is this even a debate?
- graemep 2y ago
  Confiscation until the next day could cause all sorts of problems. For example my daughter needs a smartphone app for bus tickets. It would be a lot more expensive to buy a single ticket to get home and I suppose (especially with younger kids) its going to be difficult to ensure they have the money to get home - or the phone might be their main means of payment. People are dependent on smartphones to live day to day, in a way that they were not on simple mobile phones.
  - dbbk 2y ago
    Next day is excessive, end of the day is punishment enough
  - walthamstow 2y ago
    > Confiscation until the next day could cause all sorts of problems. Don't use your phone in class and it won't get confiscated. What's the problem?
  - rob_c 2y ago
    I'm sorry but my honest response to that is something is failing there, either education or parent but you're both using the child as an excuse. Having to walk home or wait to get picked up from school to be punished isn't crazy its called consequences which children need to be taught.
    - graemep 2y ago
      Judgement without facts. it would be OK in our case, but lots of kids live too far away to walk. Not everyone has a car. it was also an example of how hard it is to do without it. My daughter is old enough not to need those rules and at this point (and at a sixth form college: a school that only takes kids 16+) I do not think such rules are needed. For a more real example one parent told me of their low income family free travel to school that required a mobile app, but the school banned kids from even taking phones in.

by duxup 2y ago

jonhohle 2y ago

Our school has similar restriction, but then shoved Chromebooks in front of every kid and they use chat instead of text, watch videos, and play games all through class instead. When I’ve tried to find alternatives for my more distractible kids, the school acts like we’re putting them out. What is the point of a cell phone ban when it’s just replaced with a more capable device?

dylan604 2y ago
If a school doesn’t have an IT policy of blocking YouTube and socials, then they are just inept. If the school is buying instructional material that requires that, then they are inept. If an instructional company is making anything requiring any of that, they are inept.
- rob_c 2y ago
  Yeah but most IT graduates working in a UK school on that salary are beyond inept in all honesty which is why do y many kids are able to find ways around the tills they use...
  - sahmeepee 2y ago
    That is quite an offensive and uninformed comment. I worked in that sector a long time ago and your hipshot is very far from my lived experience. If you want to educate yourself in what the large community of typically very dedicated IT workers in UK schools do to protect children from online harm, search for edugeek and take a look through their "filtering" related forum. Back when I did that kind of work the web filtering tools were stil mostly commercial, e.g. Websense, and we maintained reasonably good control, but it was a cat and mouse effort. As just one example, for blocking games it wasn't enough just to block all game websites (new ones every day) and all "proxy" sites as they were known (new ones every hour), you'd also have to block things the kids brought in. At one point we wrote a script that scanned files to find all Excel documents with Flash games embedded within them via an activex component and nuke them. This is all against the backdrop of maintaining an incredibly diverse IT setup where commercial software often had utterly appalling requirements but was mandated from on high. I now work in an organisation with >£1bn turnover and it probably has fewer licensed software packages than just one secondary school I used to work for. What you realise over time is that the technical tools are not really the solution. Classroom teachers need to use their skills to keep children on task. Schools need to use their existing disciplinary protocols when children don't follow the agreed rules. IT staff need to provide a baseline level of safety to ensure that no child can accidentally or casually break the IT rules.
    - jonhohle 2y ago
      You know how you get it right? Either on prem, offline everything, or explicit allow lists controlled by teachers for that specific period. Disable USB ports. That’s what we moved to for one of our kids who couldn’t handle it. Except we have to control the access because the school won’t. It works. Is it perfect? No. Google Docs is the worst due to embedding. But it beats whack-a-mole. I’ve now had to do the management job of six teachers because they apparently don’t have the skill to deal with 30 kids with Swiss cheese restrictions. This, despite significant investments in software.
      - rob_c 2y ago
        I salute getting it right and not getting in a huff. Some of the best sysadmins I've met are around academia because of the culture and they don't explode when being told their peers need to do better.
    - rob_c 2y ago
      I guarantee you that this is not an uninformed comment. Exactly the opposite. All I'll tell you is: a) you're failing at stopping malicious internal actors you're simply fixing tick boxes b) most school networks are a complete nightmare or worse laughable with next to no separation of resources (marking a drive as hidden on windows isn't secure) c) maintaining an adult block isn't something to be proud of, there's services that do that for free at the perimeter they're called firewalls, deploy and forget, if that's not the case you are doing it wrong. d) oh fudjing wow you wrote a script. This makes you a l33t sysadmin among your peers... Try taking to someone who deploys Linux at scale, this is Tuesday morning to them. Stop blaming the teachers, and while we're at it, train them to not get fished by the smart kids...
- jonhohle 2y ago
  If they’d train on my child’s search and browser history, they’d probably close most holes within minutes of them being known. smh
arrowsmith 2y ago
If my child’s school had them playing games on Chromebooks all class, I would move them to a different school.
- rob_c 2y ago
  In Scotland it's iPads paid for by London so move them there at least :p
duxup 2y ago
At least for my kids their Chromebook traffic is all routed through the school (or the school's filter provider...) and through a web filter. It is updated regularly, presumably by the filter provider.

arrowsmith 2y ago

This was the policy at my school ~20 years ago. “Smartphones” didn’t exist, but mobile phones were ubiquitous and every kid owned one. But they weren’t allowed in the classroom, and if you were found to have one in the classroom (even if it was switched off in your pocket), it would immediately be confiscated and you wouldn’t get it back until at least the next day. Why would any school not have this policy? What possible reason is there to allow phones in the classroom? How is this even a debate?

graemep 2y ago
Confiscation until the next day could cause all sorts of problems. For example my daughter needs a smartphone app for bus tickets. It would be a lot more expensive to buy a single ticket to get home and I suppose (especially with younger kids) its going to be difficult to ensure they have the money to get home - or the phone might be their main means of payment. People are dependent on smartphones to live day to day, in a way that they were not on simple mobile phones.
- dbbk 2y ago
  Next day is excessive, end of the day is punishment enough
- walthamstow 2y ago
  > Confiscation until the next day could cause all sorts of problems. Don't use your phone in class and it won't get confiscated. What's the problem?
- rob_c 2y ago
  I'm sorry but my honest response to that is something is failing there, either education or parent but you're both using the child as an excuse. Having to walk home or wait to get picked up from school to be punished isn't crazy its called consequences which children need to be taught.
  - graemep 2y ago
    Judgement without facts. it would be OK in our case, but lots of kids live too far away to walk. Not everyone has a car. it was also an example of how hard it is to do without it. My daughter is old enough not to need those rules and at this point (and at a sixth form college: a school that only takes kids 16+) I do not think such rules are needed. For a more real example one parent told me of their low income family free travel to school that required a mobile app, but the school banned kids from even taking phones in.