Is Santiago taking away our phones? California Governor Gavin Newsome has passed Assembly Bill 3216, or the Phone-Free School Act, to manage the excessive use of cell phones in academic settings throughout school hours, set to be enforced in California schools by July 1st, 2026. California Assembly Members Josh Hoover, Al Muratsuchi, and Josh Lowenthal have introduced this bill to address the growing problem of unregulated device use. This has been an ongoing complaint by educators and school staff for the last few years, as technology continues to become more and more prominent in the school environment, causing distractions and other complications during learning. A new school phone policy is being implemented across California schools. Though many schools in the Los Angeles school district have already seen the onset of this policy, most CNUSD schools still need to draft their own policies.
The CNUSD Board of Education conducted a regular meeting on July 9th, 2024. For a small portion of this meeting, Dr. Alexis Barile and Dr. Jukubic, employees of CNUSD, got up to discuss this state-wide phone policy in schools, how schools in the CNUSD district will adapt to this new stratagem, the previously observed effects of similar policies, and the time frame for all of this to occur. You can still view their presentation to the school board in the YouTube recording. Their presentation begins at 40:00 minutes into the recording.
Barile is currently an administrative director for CNUSD and was formerly the principal at Corona Fundamental Intermediate School, where a phone policy has been in effect for the past two years. With the phone policy at CFIS, students were not allowed to take their phones out at all throughout the school day, including during lunch and passing periods. Barile claims the results of this policy were remarkable, with improved academic performance, elevated engagement in campus activities, a reduction in cyberbullying incidents, more respectfulness in classrooms, fewer distractions, and increased physical activity. As someone who has seen the effects of implementing a phone policy in schools, Barile encourages schools to take action to do the same.
Barile noted three levels of this phone policy for schools to execute. Level One would restrict students from using their phones in class only when it is essential for the curriculum. This may be an assignment that requires a phone, making a digital hall pass, needing to scan something, etc. However, teachers need to enforce that this phone use is strictly for academic purposes and not for watching movies, going on social media, or recording videos. Moving on to Level Two, Barile states that this level allows students to carry their phones, but they can only take them out of their backpacks during the school day. In Level Three, students must put their phones in phone caddies or storage units before class and are to retrieve them when class time is over.
This policy will be implemented in all California school districts and educational districts from K through 12th grade. According to Ed Source, Florida, Indiana, Ohio, South Carolina, and Louisiana are also said to be following similar acts. Legislatures passed a law in 2019 to allow districts to mediate the excessive smartphone issue; however, not much has improved since then. Assembly Bill 3216 was created to solve the problems the other failed to fix.
California’s new Phone-Free School Act addresses the ongoing issues caused by excessive phone use in schools, setting the stage for a more focused and engaged learning environment. With schools like Corona Fundamental Intermediate already seeing the benefits of limiting phone access, this policy is expected to bring similar improvements statewide. As districts like CNUSD prepare for the upcoming changes, the hope is that the positive outcomes, such as better academic performance and fewer distractions, will soon become a reality for all California schools. Students should expect to see a new policy rollout this January if everything goes as planned.
