At a Dublin middle school Wednesday, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed legislation ordering school districts around the state to develop written policies for cellphones on campus. The state education department will write it’s own model policy that districts may adopt, but so long as they come up with something to keep cellphone use “as limited as possible” districts can do what they like.
Several districts around the state stood up their own cellphone policies well before state lawmakers acted. Dublin City Schools, for instance, prohibited cell phones in high school classrooms this year, but they eliminated them completely for middle schools.
“It’s so much fun to walk into a middle school lunch again,” Superintendent John Marschhausen explained. “Because it used to be you’d go in and it’d be somewhat quiet, kids looking down at their phones. But now that it’s loud, it’s fun, and the interaction and the interpersonal skills that students learn is increasing.”
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