The Corona-Norco Unified School District (CNUSD) Board of Education this month heard from district staff about the creation of a new no cellphone policy, which would ban students from using personal cellphones on campus.
“From August until December of this year, we’re going to spend time data collecting … with all the different stakeholder groups,” Alexis Barile, administrative director for human resources, said. “What we’re looking at in developing, and which is in its infancy stages right now, is really gathering the stakeholder input and data collection, and then monitoring the impact of the policy of the schools that are already piloting it.”
Those stakeholder groups will include students, parents, staff and the greater CNUSD community who will provide input on a policy that Barile said is slated to come back to the board in December with the goal of implementing it districtwide come January.
Kelli Jakubik, administrative director for instructional support, said the district was looking at three different approaches, what she called levels, for the policy. The first would allow students to take out their phones and use them during class time as long as it was for class purposes. The second would allow students to hold onto their phones, but would require them to keep their phones in their pockets or backpacks. The final approach would be to have students put their phones in a phone caddy at the start of class and retrieve them at the end of class.
“One of the things that we wanted to ensure others is that phones are going to be available for emergencies,” Kelli Jakubik, administrative director for instructional support, said. “I know that’s a big concern, and so we want to make sure phones are still available for emergencies.”
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Jakubic said that when she was principal at Corona Fundamental Intermediate School, the school adopted the second option, having students turn their cellphones off and putting them away in their backpacks at the start of the day, and experienced immediate and ongoing positive outcomes.
“We saw it improved academic performance and students increased engagement on campus throughout the day — this included lunchtime as well,” she said. “We also saw that our teachers found enhanced teaching experiences, and students were more focused in the classroom.”
Other schools piloting the policy include Philistine Rondo School of Discovery and Cesar Chavez Academy. And, starting this year, Board Vice President Stacy Nicola said Norco Intermediate School would also start piloting the policy.
“I think it’s just a really exciting kind of new frontier that we’re going on, and I really appreciate the courage that it takes to do something that is not very popular, especially amongst the kids and maybe even their family,” Nicola said. “So kudos to us for being courageous.”
A full recording of the meeting can be found here on the district’s YouTube channel.
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