Perrin-Whitt students required to store personal communication devices at school

Perrin-Whitt CISD laid out the district's new policy for student personal communication devices, prohibiting their use on campus during the school day.

Gov. Greg Abbott signed House Bill 1481 into law in June, effective Sept. 1, banning students in kindergarten through 12th grade from using cell phones while at school, giving each school district the discretion to decide how to implement that change.

Perrin-Whitt students in pre-K through sixth grade will not be permitted to bring personal communication devices, including cell phones, tablets, smart watches, laptops or wireless earbuds to school. Students in seventh through 12th grade will be allowed to store their devices in their backpacks, locked in a school-issued pouch.

Students will be responsible for keeping up with their pouches and remembering to bring them to school each day.

Yondr is a pouch secured with a magnetic lock. Students place their devices in their pouch at the beginning of the school day, lock it and then store it in their backpack or locker. Using a device mounted near building exits, students unlock their pouches at the end of the day.

Another unlocking device will be mounted outside the school for students who forget to unlock their pouch after school or over the weekend.

“We all know there will be some little Johnny who forgets to unlock his pouch and it’s a Thursday afternoon and he realizes he can’t get his earbuds out for the weekend,” PWCISD Superintendent Loren Sell said. “[The unlocking device] will have a padlock on it during the school day. After school, nights and weekends it will be unlocked so it’s accessible.”

Pouches may also be unlocked if a student is picked up early from school or if they leave for extracurricular activities.

Funding for the pouches was covered under the district’s safety grant at about $4,000.

Rather than using the pouches, Sell said the district could trust students to store their own devices but it would be hard to monitor.

“We’ve had the policy that they’re not supposed to have their cell phones out during class time. The problem is they go to the bathroom with them,” Sell said. “Cell phones in general—obviously there’s positives to having them—but they’re also the number one root cause of most of our discipline problems.”

The intent of the new law was to decrease the amount of distraction in the classroom, with supporters of the ban arguing cell phones interfered with students’ ability to focus and engage in the material.

Board members were reluctant to approve the student handbook for the upcoming school year, which included the new cell phone policy. Sell assured the board the district could amend the policy at any time if needed.

“This is utterly stupid,” PWCISD board member Chad Lambert said.

Lambert asked what the district’s plan was in case of emergencies when a teacher was not present, especially in facilities like the Ag building.

“We’ve had a seizure in the Ag barn that the only notification was from another student who called. Are we going to have to wait for them to run somewhere?” Lambert said.

Lambert said he was opposed to the new law and said it would only create problems, especially during an emergency.

“I have problems with that. I absolutely have problems, all the way around with that,” Lambert said. “If we’re going to do that we’re going to have to figure something out with our outlying facilities. I know it’s very few and far between, but the one time someone is seizing out there and it’s a delayed response because we had to wait for someone to run somewhere…it’s an absolute problem.”

Lambert said it was a failure to not plan for an issue that has happened.

The board agreed with Lambert’s concerns and Sell said the district would reevaluate the location of its landlines to make them more accessible.

The new policy was approved under the condition the district make landlines more available campus-wide.