After my initial shock, I started to actually think that this policy was good, because it meant that my school was not dealing with the distraction of cell phones in the classroom. This is something that I heard some of my colleagues struggling with in different schools, so it is nice to have the administrative support against the use of cell phones in class. Furthermore, because the punishment is so strict, cell phones are mostly not a problem.
However, when they are a problem, I think, in the end, the punishment is too strict. I don't like the underlying idea of suspending students from schools anyway, so I think that a better solution might be for only 1-day suspension or taking away the student's cell phone.
Today, a student was suspended for the second time for using his cell phone. Six days out of school suspension for the two incidences is only setting up the student for failure, in my opinion. Moreover, no tolerance policies don't allow for special circumstances either...
I do agree that students shouldn't be using cell phones in class unless if the use is for an educational purpose, and I do agree that the policy about it needs to be strong enough to be effective, yet I still hold to my opinion that 3 days is too long to be suspended.
Also, I am curious to know what other people think about this who are at WMHS?
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3 comments:
Hey Autumn-
I would tend to agree with you, three days seems pretty steep. Would one day not deter students? Or even worse, take away their phone and leave it in the office for a couple weeks. This is much worse probably than suspension, and they get to keep learning!
I agree with you on this point. I too feel that an automatic suspension is an incredibly harsh consequence and one that could potentially set students up for failure. While I understand that the school must have some way to discipline the students that break this rule, perhaps taking away their phone would be a better solution. Personally, I think that students would be much more reluctant to use their phones if they knew they could be taken away. A suspension, while serious, is often not taken seriously by students. They see it as time out of class, and less as a punishment. I think a better option would be to take away their cell phones and see how they respond. It's at least worth a try...:)
Afab!
I agree with you, three days is too much! However, in my placement where cellphones are not outlawed it really can be a distraction. We were told to be aware that parents, for childcare and transportation reasons, often need to be able to reach their and to be accommodating to this. The result is students caught using cell phones always say they are expecting a call from their parent. There really does have to be a happy medium somewhere.
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