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Smartphones are banned at school in Aus, for a strong net positive. Kids still sneak them into toilets and so on (and vapes), but the overwhelming impact has be

Smartphones are banned at school in Aus, for a strong net positive. Kids still sneak them into toilets and so on (and vapes), but the overwhelming impact has been positive.

x2tyfi 1y ago
It’s surprising that more schools haven’t done this. I suspect that we’ll look back in 10 years with it being common and ask ourselves what took so long.
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago
  > surprising that more schools haven’t done this We have a depressing state in America where you can predict the parents’ income based on whether their kids’ school bans smartphones.
  - rwmj 1y ago
    And the kids' future incomes as well.
- crooked-v 1y ago
  In the US we've completely given up on stopping school shootings, and parents have instead decided that the better thing to fight for is their children having cell phones so they can hear the child's last words when the school shooting happens.
  - conradev 1y ago
    It’s not actually about school shootings in the US, as much as that might be cited as justification. Some parents just want to be able to text their kids all day.
  - milesrout 1y ago
    School shootings are extremely rare. If you want to protect kids you will be much more effective if you work on pedestrian safety, or anything related to driving at all really.
  - School-Cotton 1y ago
    People who claim that as the reason they want to allow phones are simply lying.
  - throw83949459 1y ago
    I am more worried about dogs in school. Many teacher are fine to blame 11 years old for "provoking" dog attack! It is ok to send a kid to hospital, for eating a sandwitch! Teachers at my school do not believe allergies are real! If there is asthma attack, it is an uncorrelated event! School will stab my kid with epipen, call ambulance and send me hospital bill! Avoiding it is too much work! Once school brought unrestrained police dogs to school for a demonstration! Those had a record of attacking and torturing suspects! Being able to call help is a basic human right!
  - Aeolun 1y ago
    I think the phones are one thing. It was a bit distressing to hear that US schools have “school shooting drills” like Japan schools have “earthquake drills”.
    - crooked-v 1y ago
      Wait until you hear about how teachers started stocking emergency toilets because of those multi-hour drills, and the right wing in the US responded by using it to accuse schools of setting up litter boxes for self-identified 'furries' in the student body.
      - huhkerrf 1y ago
        You're just making things up, just like those people perpetuating the litter box hoax. > The only known official instance of cat litter being placed in school classrooms for potential use by students was in the late 2010s by the Jefferson County Public School District in Colorado, where the 1999 Columbine High School massacre took place. Some teachers were given "go buckets" that contained cat litter to be used as a toilet in an emergency lockdown situation, such as during a school shooting. _Only known official instance_ and not for drills, but in case there was an emergency situation.
        crooked-v 1y ago
        Here's a 2019 article that took a two-minute search to find: https://www.newsweek.com/colorado-schools-issuing-buckets-kitty-litter-students-go-bathroom-during-lockdowns-school-1455261 https://www.newsweek.com/colorado-schools-issuing-buckets-ki... > Parents and teachers in a Colorado school district were surprised by some new additions to the list of necessary back-to-school supplies—including kitty litter, buckets and trash bags. > The products are part of Jefferson County's "Emergency Go Bucket," a way for students to relieve themselves in the event of a prolonged lockdown because of an active shooter.
        deleted 1y ago
        [deleted]
  - what 1y ago
    You could give them a shitty flip phone for that.
  - Gigachad 1y ago
    At least in Australia the phone ban doesn’t mean you can’t have a phone in your pocket, you just can’t take it out. Taking your phone out when I was in school meant having it placed on the teachers desk until the end of class, and possibly some other kind of penalty if they particularly didn’t like you. But you always got your phone back before leaving the class.
    - yurishimo 1y ago
      So, exactly how it was when cellphones first became commonplace? I started high school in 2008 and had a flip phone at that time. Yea, literally everyone was texting behind their back, under a desk, or whatever but it was fine. If we got caught, the teacher picked it up and we could come pick it up at the end of the day. I can imagine if the current “meta” is literally holding your phone in your hand for the entire school day that problems would indeed arise. Personally, I think banning phones in the classroom similar to what I grew up with is the minimum. If students still have poor outcomes or are being bullied by other kids sneaking phones, then yea, collect them at the door or implement stricter punishment for students caught with a phone.
      - Gigachad 1y ago
        In public schools in Australia you could just openly use your phone until this new rule
  - vinay427 1y ago
    I’m not sure what ‘the US’ means here. In California it’s now required (as of next year) for schools to limit or restrict student phone use, and several other states have done similar things as mentioned in the article [1]. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/24/california-school-cellphone-restriction-student https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/24/california-s...
    - mcny 1y ago
      I think it is reasonable for a teacher to say you can't actively use your phone while class is in session but not appropriate for them to say you can't have your phone on you. It is also inappropriate to say your phone must be in some special pouch that only they can open, etc. This is just my own opinion, of course. I think it is also inappropriate to say you need someone's permission to use the restroom. All my opinions of appropriate ness is mostly about adults behaving like adults though. They probably don't make sense when it comes to children?
      - vinay427 1y ago
        I tend to agree, and the vast majority of policies that I've seen (e.g. US states) do in fact target the use of phones, not possession. Schools in the CA bill can continue to implement or exceed those requirements as they see fit.
  - huhkerrf 1y ago
    > parents have instead decided that the better thing to fight for is their children having cell phones so they can hear the child's last words when the school shooting happens. What's a ridiculous appeal to emotion. Between 2020 and 2022 there were 131 school shooting deaths, including suicides. Let's put those all in 2022, and assume that there were actually 0 suicides. That means you have a 0.0026% chance to be killed (at most) in a school shooting. This is too much, but this is not the reason to allow cell phones in schools. Come on.
- dartharva 1y ago
  Most schools in the Eastern Hemisphere have always been doing this. It is basic common sense to not allow phones in classrooms.
- Gigachad 1y ago
  In Australia all the private schools have done it for ages, it’s just only recent that public schools did it. Sure we still did sneak in a bit of phone usage in the bathrooms and behind secluded buildings but it’s a huge difference from being able to freely scroll social media all day.
fuckaj 1y ago
Ohhh I assumed all countries did that. Like common sense.
Aerroon 1y ago
How do you know that it has had an overwhelmingly positive impact? Can we, for example, see a marked increase in PISA scores for Australia from after the ban? Or is this one of those "I hate phones, therefore banning them must be good for kids" things?
- jajko 1y ago
  What sort of argument is that? Anybody who lived long enough anywqhere saw many times what a cancer screens are to kids and their development, the smaller the worse. You can't make any sort of strawman out of this topic, its proper cancer. If you want to measure something for this measure happiness or strength of social circles. Good luck with that.
  - logicchains 1y ago
    >What sort of argument is that? Anybody who lived long enough anywqhere saw many times what a cancer screens are to kids and their development, the smaller the worse. You can't make any sort of strawman out of this topic, its proper cancer. That's not science, that's a demonstrably false assumption that everyone thinks smartphone usage is bad for kids. In my experience with kids and smartphones, kids of the young generation (gen Z) are way better informed (and less brainwashed) than kids of their parents' generation were, whose only access to information about the world when growing up was through the captured, centralised legacy media.
    - xboxnolifes 1y ago
      Using their phones while in class makes them more informed?
  - Aerroon 1y ago
    Then it should be extremely easy to demonstrate strong positive results from these phone bans. But we don't see them!
- devjab 1y ago
  These are the key findings from the UK research which was part of the reason we started banning phones in schools here in Denmark. > our results indicate that there is an improvement in student performance of 6.41% of a standard deviation in schools that have introduced a mobile phone ban. > Finally, we find that mobile phone bans have very different effects on different types of students. Banning mobile phones improves outcomes for the low-achieving students (14.23% of a standard deviation) the most and has no significant impact on high achievers. The results suggest that low-achieving students are more likely to be distracted by the presence of mobile phones, while high achievers can focus in the classroom regardless of whether phones are present. https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp1350.pdf https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp1350.pdf I believe OECD and Pisa results have also pointed towards banning as a net postive since their 2022 report. I think it's fair to say that it's not a "black-and-white" thing. As the research points out, digital devices aren't the only factor in the equation. I believe OECD research has also found that using a digital device with a parent can be a benefit while using it alone will most certainly be a negative for children aged 2-6. I'm sure you can imagine why there might also be other factors that make a difference between parents who can spend time with their children and those who can't. Aside from that there are also benefits from digital devices for students with learning disabilities like dyslexia. In most class-rooms this can be solved by computers + headphones, but for crafts people (I'm not sure what the English word for a school that teaches plumbers, carpenters etc. is), having a mobile phone in the workshop can often help a lot with insturctions, manuals and such. So it's not clear cut, but over all, banning phones and smartwatches seem to be a great idea.
jnxx 1y ago
So what needs to happen to ban smartphone use while driving? I mean not "formally forbidden" but "thoroughly enforced". Personally, I avoid phone use even as a pedestrian in busy city spaces - I think the time it takes to fully switch attention to be fully aware of things like a reckless driver running a red light is too long to not affect safety.
- j0057 1y ago
  In the Netherlands we have 'focus cameras' now that specifically detect smartphone use while driving, with hefty fines of €430. These cameras are mobile as well, so they get placed on different spots over time.
- autoexec 1y ago
  Every phone has sensors that can tell when they're being used in the car and how many other phones are near them. An increasing number of cars have cameras pointed directly at the driver and sensors that detect how many passengers are in the in vehicle. Thanks to our glorious surveillance state it's likely that all the data we need to detect people using their phones while driving is already being routinely collected.
Grimburger 1y ago
> but the overwhelming impact has been positive You definitely need a source for that comment given that it only just happened. Smartphones are neutral pieces of technology. It can create the next Einstein or radicalise the next terrorist, the 1's and 0's don't mind. Why not ban them at universities also? Are these kids suddenly protected the moment they leave high school? Like your opinion I have my own, and banning smartphones in Australian high schools will turn out to be overwhelmingly negative for outcomes. I predict it will be reversed and looked back upon as a failure. Khan academy taught me more than dozens of different teachers. Kids are now blocked from accessing it for their entire time at school and when they would be most intruiged to learn. Just like terrible having internet, Australians seem intent on being left behind in a hypercompetitive world.
- averageRoyalty 1y ago
  > You definitely need a source for that comment given that it only just happened. I don't know a lot about the impact, but this happened about 2 years ago in multiple states. Here's some thoughts from those who have looked further: https://thepostsa.au/education/2025/03/26/more-laughter-more-activity-how-sas-phone-ban-changed-this-schools-culture/ https://thepostsa.au/education/2025/03/26/more-laughter-more... https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-all-the-recent-evidence-on-mobile-phone-bans-in-schools-this-is-what-we-found-224848 https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-all-the-recent-evid... https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/mobile-phone-ban-improves-learning-concentration-and-socialisation https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/mobile-phone-ban-impro...
  - Grimburger 1y ago
    > https://thepostsa.au https://thepostsa.au Anyone can read that site and make up their minds about the scientific merit of it's claims. I assume it's very intentional that it's right down the bottom in tiny text that's it state government owned media vehicle > https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-all-the-recent-evidence-on-mobile-phone-bans-in-schools-this-is-what-we-found-224848 https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-all-the-recent-evid... "Our team screened 1,317 articles and reports as well as dissertations from masters and PhD students. We identified 22 studies that examined schools before and after phone bans." "Our research found four studies that identified a slight improvement in academic achievement when phones were banned in schools. However, two of these studies found this improvement only applied to disadvantaged or low-achieving students." "In a sign of just how little research there is on this topic, 12 of the studies we identified were done by masters and doctoral students. This means they are not peer-reviewed" Do you really want to keep wasting people's times here because I'm more than happy to debate it with someone who actually cares. Nothing in that article suggests it's of overwhelming benefit. I'm talking much bigger than teachers having an easier job too, education outcomes like this take decades to be seen. > https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/mobile-phone-ban-improves-learning-concentration-and-socialisation https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/mobile-phone-ban-impro... >gov.au/media-releases/ Mate you've spammed us all with the first things you've found on google. Correct?

Smartphones are banned at school in Aus, for a strong net positive. Kids still sneak them into toilets and so on (and vapes), but the overwhelming impact has been positive.

x2tyfi 1y ago

It’s surprising that more schools haven’t done this. I suspect that we’ll look back in 10 years with it being common and ask ourselves what took so long.

JumpCrisscross 1y ago
> surprising that more schools haven’t done this We have a depressing state in America where you can predict the parents’ income based on whether their kids’ school bans smartphones.
- rwmj 1y ago
  And the kids' future incomes as well.
crooked-v 1y ago
In the US we've completely given up on stopping school shootings, and parents have instead decided that the better thing to fight for is their children having cell phones so they can hear the child's last words when the school shooting happens.
- conradev 1y ago
  It’s not actually about school shootings in the US, as much as that might be cited as justification. Some parents just want to be able to text their kids all day.
- milesrout 1y ago
  School shootings are extremely rare. If you want to protect kids you will be much more effective if you work on pedestrian safety, or anything related to driving at all really.
- School-Cotton 1y ago
  People who claim that as the reason they want to allow phones are simply lying.
- throw83949459 1y ago
  I am more worried about dogs in school. Many teacher are fine to blame 11 years old for "provoking" dog attack! It is ok to send a kid to hospital, for eating a sandwitch! Teachers at my school do not believe allergies are real! If there is asthma attack, it is an uncorrelated event! School will stab my kid with epipen, call ambulance and send me hospital bill! Avoiding it is too much work! Once school brought unrestrained police dogs to school for a demonstration! Those had a record of attacking and torturing suspects! Being able to call help is a basic human right!
- Aeolun 1y ago
  I think the phones are one thing. It was a bit distressing to hear that US schools have “school shooting drills” like Japan schools have “earthquake drills”.
  - crooked-v 1y ago
    Wait until you hear about how teachers started stocking emergency toilets because of those multi-hour drills, and the right wing in the US responded by using it to accuse schools of setting up litter boxes for self-identified 'furries' in the student body.
    - huhkerrf 1y ago
      You're just making things up, just like those people perpetuating the litter box hoax. > The only known official instance of cat litter being placed in school classrooms for potential use by students was in the late 2010s by the Jefferson County Public School District in Colorado, where the 1999 Columbine High School massacre took place. Some teachers were given "go buckets" that contained cat litter to be used as a toilet in an emergency lockdown situation, such as during a school shooting. _Only known official instance_ and not for drills, but in case there was an emergency situation.
      - crooked-v 1y ago
        Here's a 2019 article that took a two-minute search to find: https://www.newsweek.com/colorado-schools-issuing-buckets-kitty-litter-students-go-bathroom-during-lockdowns-school-1455261 https://www.newsweek.com/colorado-schools-issuing-buckets-ki... > Parents and teachers in a Colorado school district were surprised by some new additions to the list of necessary back-to-school supplies—including kitty litter, buckets and trash bags. > The products are part of Jefferson County's "Emergency Go Bucket," a way for students to relieve themselves in the event of a prolonged lockdown because of an active shooter.
        deleted 1y ago
        [deleted]
- what 1y ago
  You could give them a shitty flip phone for that.
- Gigachad 1y ago
  At least in Australia the phone ban doesn’t mean you can’t have a phone in your pocket, you just can’t take it out. Taking your phone out when I was in school meant having it placed on the teachers desk until the end of class, and possibly some other kind of penalty if they particularly didn’t like you. But you always got your phone back before leaving the class.
  - yurishimo 1y ago
    So, exactly how it was when cellphones first became commonplace? I started high school in 2008 and had a flip phone at that time. Yea, literally everyone was texting behind their back, under a desk, or whatever but it was fine. If we got caught, the teacher picked it up and we could come pick it up at the end of the day. I can imagine if the current “meta” is literally holding your phone in your hand for the entire school day that problems would indeed arise. Personally, I think banning phones in the classroom similar to what I grew up with is the minimum. If students still have poor outcomes or are being bullied by other kids sneaking phones, then yea, collect them at the door or implement stricter punishment for students caught with a phone.
    - Gigachad 1y ago
      In public schools in Australia you could just openly use your phone until this new rule
- vinay427 1y ago
  I’m not sure what ‘the US’ means here. In California it’s now required (as of next year) for schools to limit or restrict student phone use, and several other states have done similar things as mentioned in the article [1]. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/24/california-school-cellphone-restriction-student https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/24/california-s...
  - mcny 1y ago
    I think it is reasonable for a teacher to say you can't actively use your phone while class is in session but not appropriate for them to say you can't have your phone on you. It is also inappropriate to say your phone must be in some special pouch that only they can open, etc. This is just my own opinion, of course. I think it is also inappropriate to say you need someone's permission to use the restroom. All my opinions of appropriate ness is mostly about adults behaving like adults though. They probably don't make sense when it comes to children?
    - vinay427 1y ago
      I tend to agree, and the vast majority of policies that I've seen (e.g. US states) do in fact target the use of phones, not possession. Schools in the CA bill can continue to implement or exceed those requirements as they see fit.
- huhkerrf 1y ago
  > parents have instead decided that the better thing to fight for is their children having cell phones so they can hear the child's last words when the school shooting happens. What's a ridiculous appeal to emotion. Between 2020 and 2022 there were 131 school shooting deaths, including suicides. Let's put those all in 2022, and assume that there were actually 0 suicides. That means you have a 0.0026% chance to be killed (at most) in a school shooting. This is too much, but this is not the reason to allow cell phones in schools. Come on.
dartharva 1y ago
Most schools in the Eastern Hemisphere have always been doing this. It is basic common sense to not allow phones in classrooms.
Gigachad 1y ago
In Australia all the private schools have done it for ages, it’s just only recent that public schools did it. Sure we still did sneak in a bit of phone usage in the bathrooms and behind secluded buildings but it’s a huge difference from being able to freely scroll social media all day.

fuckaj 1y ago

Ohhh I assumed all countries did that. Like common sense.

Aerroon 1y ago

How do you know that it has had an overwhelmingly positive impact? Can we, for example, see a marked increase in PISA scores for Australia from after the ban? Or is this one of those "I hate phones, therefore banning them must be good for kids" things?

jajko 1y ago
What sort of argument is that? Anybody who lived long enough anywqhere saw many times what a cancer screens are to kids and their development, the smaller the worse. You can't make any sort of strawman out of this topic, its proper cancer. If you want to measure something for this measure happiness or strength of social circles. Good luck with that.
- logicchains 1y ago
  >What sort of argument is that? Anybody who lived long enough anywqhere saw many times what a cancer screens are to kids and their development, the smaller the worse. You can't make any sort of strawman out of this topic, its proper cancer. That's not science, that's a demonstrably false assumption that everyone thinks smartphone usage is bad for kids. In my experience with kids and smartphones, kids of the young generation (gen Z) are way better informed (and less brainwashed) than kids of their parents' generation were, whose only access to information about the world when growing up was through the captured, centralised legacy media.
  - xboxnolifes 1y ago
    Using their phones while in class makes them more informed?
- Aerroon 1y ago
  Then it should be extremely easy to demonstrate strong positive results from these phone bans. But we don't see them!
devjab 1y ago
These are the key findings from the UK research which was part of the reason we started banning phones in schools here in Denmark. > our results indicate that there is an improvement in student performance of 6.41% of a standard deviation in schools that have introduced a mobile phone ban. > Finally, we find that mobile phone bans have very different effects on different types of students. Banning mobile phones improves outcomes for the low-achieving students (14.23% of a standard deviation) the most and has no significant impact on high achievers. The results suggest that low-achieving students are more likely to be distracted by the presence of mobile phones, while high achievers can focus in the classroom regardless of whether phones are present. https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp1350.pdf https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp1350.pdf I believe OECD and Pisa results have also pointed towards banning as a net postive since their 2022 report. I think it's fair to say that it's not a "black-and-white" thing. As the research points out, digital devices aren't the only factor in the equation. I believe OECD research has also found that using a digital device with a parent can be a benefit while using it alone will most certainly be a negative for children aged 2-6. I'm sure you can imagine why there might also be other factors that make a difference between parents who can spend time with their children and those who can't. Aside from that there are also benefits from digital devices for students with learning disabilities like dyslexia. In most class-rooms this can be solved by computers + headphones, but for crafts people (I'm not sure what the English word for a school that teaches plumbers, carpenters etc. is), having a mobile phone in the workshop can often help a lot with insturctions, manuals and such. So it's not clear cut, but over all, banning phones and smartwatches seem to be a great idea.

jnxx 1y ago

So what needs to happen to ban smartphone use while driving? I mean not "formally forbidden" but "thoroughly enforced". Personally, I avoid phone use even as a pedestrian in busy city spaces - I think the time it takes to fully switch attention to be fully aware of things like a reckless driver running a red light is too long to not affect safety.

j0057 1y ago
In the Netherlands we have 'focus cameras' now that specifically detect smartphone use while driving, with hefty fines of €430. These cameras are mobile as well, so they get placed on different spots over time.
autoexec 1y ago
Every phone has sensors that can tell when they're being used in the car and how many other phones are near them. An increasing number of cars have cameras pointed directly at the driver and sensors that detect how many passengers are in the in vehicle. Thanks to our glorious surveillance state it's likely that all the data we need to detect people using their phones while driving is already being routinely collected.

Grimburger 1y ago

> but the overwhelming impact has been positive You definitely need a source for that comment given that it only just happened. Smartphones are neutral pieces of technology. It can create the next Einstein or radicalise the next terrorist, the 1's and 0's don't mind. Why not ban them at universities also? Are these kids suddenly protected the moment they leave high school? Like your opinion I have my own, and banning smartphones in Australian high schools will turn out to be overwhelmingly negative for outcomes. I predict it will be reversed and looked back upon as a failure. Khan academy taught me more than dozens of different teachers. Kids are now blocked from accessing it for their entire time at school and when they would be most intruiged to learn. Just like terrible having internet, Australians seem intent on being left behind in a hypercompetitive world.

averageRoyalty 1y ago
> You definitely need a source for that comment given that it only just happened. I don't know a lot about the impact, but this happened about 2 years ago in multiple states. Here's some thoughts from those who have looked further: https://thepostsa.au/education/2025/03/26/more-laughter-more-activity-how-sas-phone-ban-changed-this-schools-culture/ https://thepostsa.au/education/2025/03/26/more-laughter-more... https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-all-the-recent-evidence-on-mobile-phone-bans-in-schools-this-is-what-we-found-224848 https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-all-the-recent-evid... https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/mobile-phone-ban-improves-learning-concentration-and-socialisation https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/mobile-phone-ban-impro...
- Grimburger 1y ago
  > https://thepostsa.au https://thepostsa.au Anyone can read that site and make up their minds about the scientific merit of it's claims. I assume it's very intentional that it's right down the bottom in tiny text that's it state government owned media vehicle > https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-all-the-recent-evidence-on-mobile-phone-bans-in-schools-this-is-what-we-found-224848 https://theconversation.com/we-looked-at-all-the-recent-evid... "Our team screened 1,317 articles and reports as well as dissertations from masters and PhD students. We identified 22 studies that examined schools before and after phone bans." "Our research found four studies that identified a slight improvement in academic achievement when phones were banned in schools. However, two of these studies found this improvement only applied to disadvantaged or low-achieving students." "In a sign of just how little research there is on this topic, 12 of the studies we identified were done by masters and doctoral students. This means they are not peer-reviewed" Do you really want to keep wasting people's times here because I'm more than happy to debate it with someone who actually cares. Nothing in that article suggests it's of overwhelming benefit. I'm talking much bigger than teachers having an easier job too, education outcomes like this take decades to be seen. > https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/mobile-phone-ban-improves-learning-concentration-and-socialisation https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/mobile-phone-ban-impro... >gov.au/media-releases/ Mate you've spammed us all with the first things you've found on google. Correct?