Mobile phones in Australian schools are now banned under federal law in a policy announced by Minister for Education Jason Clare today.
In July, Mr. Clare said the time had come for a national policy on phones in state schools. The policy creates uniformity with state education stakeholders, many of whom had some sort of policy already in place in their territories.
Allowing children to access smartphones during school hours has long been a contentious issue. Proponents of a ban point towards an announcement in July 2023 from UNESCO, the United Nation’s education, science, and culture agency that concluded students’ learning was disrupted when distracted by smartphones in class.
The findings were published as part of UNESCO’s Global Education Monitoring Report that said proximity to a phone was found to hurt learning in 14 different countries, and the removal of smartphones from the classroom in the UK and Europe improved learning outcomes.
“Even having a phone nearby when notifications are coming through is enough to break students’ concentration, with one study showing that it can take up to 20 minutes to refocus on learning,” UNESCO said in the report.
UNESCO recommends that technology should be “seen as a means, never an end,” and that traditional teaching methods should still be employed and work symbiotically with rapid-evolving technology.
“The digital revolution holds immeasurable potential but, just as warnings have been voiced for how it should be regulated in society, similar attention must be paid to the way it is used in education,” said UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay in July.
In the United States, around 80 percent of schools now ban the non-academic use of cell phones.
The rapid advent of artificial intelligence and apps like ChatGPT is also giving rise to increased cases of cheating among students in Australia.
‘Best-Practise Approach’
Speaking last year on the policy, Mr. Clare said he wanted a best-practise approach.“I think the time has come as at the moment there are different approaches in different states. Some states ban the use of phones in primary schools, and others ban it in primary schools and high schools,” he said.
“In other places, they leave it to the judgement of the principals and in some places, the rule is to put your phone turned off in your bag, and in others, they use these magnetic pouches.
“From my point of view, this just makes sense. If you’re on TikTok in the classroom, you’re not listening to the teacher.”
Selected state bans set off a wave of video content on social media in 2023, which documented students breaking into lock pouches and posting content about how to circumnavigate bans on AI apps.
Reaction to the new policy was mixed on Mr. Clare’s Facebook page, with some posters questioning if the ban was a violation of a student’s human rights.
“Is that not a human rights violation? I think kids are human in my logical sense,” said one person.
Another opinion suggested smartphones inhibited social interaction.
“What did kids at school do before these pests of things were invented? What do they do now? They sit in the schoolyard texting and ignoring the kids around them! Human rights BS! Kids have the right to learn how to socialise with other kids at school so they can do this out in the world!”
