“It’s incredible,” said Ann Kostiuk, a school counselor for Bloomsberg Area School District. There, the middle school has had a phone ban for years, but this is the first year the high school also enforced a ban. "I’ve had teachers come up to me and say 'this is the first time they’ve actually seen high school students socializing and talking, instead of looking down.”
“If kids have their phones out and they're not learning, I feel like that's on them,” said Alani Cain, a 9th grader from Muhlenberg Jr High School.
“This is an issue that we have to get at. With all of the money that we're spending on mental health services in schools,” said Senator Ryan Aument (R-36), who sponsored a phone ban grant option in this year’s state budget. "My concern is if we don't address this, get to some of these root issues, we're not really going to move the needle.”
Should schools ban phones, and how intense should the ban be?
The Problem
“Generation Z is very different from the generations that came before along many different markers, including anxiety, depression, self harm, and even suicide,” said Zach Rausch, a lead researcher on the book 'The Anxious Generation' written by Jonathan Haidt.
In the book, researchers say the mental health crisis in today’s young people are linked to two social trends: under protection online and over protection in real life.
Specifically with access to the internet and social media, children are not developing social skills, their addiction leads to many sleepless nights (and the inability to focus in classes the next day), and social media platforms are full of cyberbullying and other dangers.
“The majority of the anxiety that I see in students is caused by things they read online, their social media,” said Emilia Mattucci, school counselor for East Allegheny High School and the executive director of the PA School Counselor Association.
For parents, cutting off contact to their child during the school day can be a nerve wracking proposition.
"The world is a scary place and will always be a scary place. But trust is a muscle that needs to be built over time,” said Rausch. "And one of the things that phones have prevented us from doing— and it’s not even just with kids— its the ability to be separate for a period of time, and to trust that people will be okay out in the world."
“Kids thrive when they are trusted with independence and given the opportunity to deal with conflicts on their own,” said Rausch. "We shouldn’t wait till kids are 18 or 19 to start giving them independence. It has to start earlier."
The Fix?
The ‘Anxious Generation’ researchers argue that while broad social change is required, schools are uniquely positioned to take the lead.
"No kid wants to be the only one who's not on a device, who's not on social media. And it's very hard for parents to say, I'm not going to give you social media, even though all of your friends are on it,” said Rausch.
"One of the things that schools can do is that they can implement a policy that would require everybody to not use their device just throughout the school day,” said Rausch. And what that does is it gives kids 7 hours of the day back to them."
Many schools have a ‘no phone in class’ policy— but Rausch, and many an exasperated teacher, say that level is not the most effective.
"With alerts, with social media, all these platforms they have been crafted in a way that keeps you coming back,” said Rausch. "And so if you have a device in your pocket, you're going to be distracted.”
A more intermediate level of banning phones is requiring phones to be powered off and stored in lockers or bags— with the phone then being turned into the office if caught.
To go all in, ‘The Anxious Generation’ encourages schools to put the device in phone lockers at the start of the day, or in a locked bag that they carry with them through the day and get unlocked at the end.
“They maintain possession. So you're not putting a teacher in a very difficult position or a school in a very difficult position taking a phone. Many are hesitant to do that,” said Senator Aument, holding up a Yondr bag, a popular brand in the phone lock up market.
Aument first introduced legislation in April to test if there was room at the state level for the phone ban conversation. In the 2024/25 budget, schools were given permission to use their mental health/security grants to purchase phone ban equipment, like Yondr bags.
The Senator continues to stay in contact with schools, and says he would have liked some structure in the program that measured impact. But he is more concerned that school districts participate at all, and does not want any barriers between them accessing state funds and resources for phone bans.
Phone Bans: A Newer, Unmeasured Solution
A recent academic paper comparing multiple phone ban research projects found, at this time, the recorded impact of phone bans are inconsistent (some show marginal or no change in academics. Some show no mental health change. Some show an increase in bullying incidents due to a punitive environment).
"Their phone might be their only sense of ease because it's distracting them from what might be stressing them in school,” said Mia Torres, a senior at Muhlenberg High School.
For her, phones can help students manage mental health.
“They might just need to get away and watch a funny video or text a friend. And I don’t think that should be something that’s taken away from them if that’s their only way of communicating what’s going on in their mind.”
Mike Simmons, middle school counselor with General McLane School District, says phone regulation is important, but schools also have to teach responsibility and proper behavior.
“Some of the issue though is education. We need to figure out how to have cell phones, and technology, and social media and all that but use it appropriately,” said Simmons.
Fear Factor
Another reasons schools don’t go all in on phone bans?
Parents are living in a world where school shootings happen.
In the face of a dangerous world, Rausch notes that access to a phone in school does little, if nothing, to guard against emergency disasters.
"It’s not actually providing the thing that we really want, which is that our kids will be safe,” said Rausch. Parents, like their kids, are equally exposed to every terrible thing going on across the globe because of smart phones.
“It’s absolutely true that terrible events happen,” said Rausch. “But we get a disproportionate sense of the bad stuff happening in the world."
Rausch notes that while the world is scary and full of unknowns, the harms of smart phones and social media for children is something society can take action on.
"Those little experiences on their devices, on their phones, their interactions with their peers, the bullying, the cyber bullying, all of that is happening all of the time. And these are things we can control,” said Rausch.
“By removing the devices, we're actually creating a safer environment for kids rather than trying to deal with a fringe, terrible potential outcome,” said Rausch. "We can deal with the thing that actually happening right now."