{"id":394459,"date":"2025-09-03T11:49:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-03T11:49:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/394459\/"},"modified":"2025-09-03T11:49:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-03T11:49:11","slug":"edinburgh-to-ban-mobile-phones-in-all-primary-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/394459\/","title":{"rendered":"Edinburgh to ban mobile phones in all primary schools"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n The primary school ban is set to come at some point from November onwards, giving council officers time to plan how the ban will be applied.\n<\/p>\n

\n Officers are set to make exemptions available for students who have a medical need to have a smartphone.\n<\/p>\n

\n Read More:<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n Councillors were in agreement at Tuesday\u2019s Education<\/a>, Children and Families committee meeting that a ban on mobiles in secondary schools was something valuable to pursue.\n<\/p>\n

\n A consultation is now set to be launched on a ban in secondary schools, with analysis set to start in January 2026 and a report presented to councillors in March of that year.\n<\/p>\n

\n If all goes to plan, the council will be in a position to ban mobile phones in secondary schools by August of next year.\n<\/p>\n

\n Education<\/a>, Children, and Families committee convener and Labour councillor James Dalgleish said: \u201cWe have to follow process and procedures and council and consultations and IIAs, and all those wonderful things.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cBut I think the potential that we have here to improve the well-being\u00a0of our pupils is an opportunity.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cI feel like this is a real turning point for improving the quality of education and for pupils, and hopefully, in some respects, assist teachers in managing the classroom.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Earlier in the meeting, councillors heard a deputation from a parent and teacher group which supported the ban.\n<\/p>\n

\n One secondary school maths teacher said: \u201cI cannot stress enough how much of a nightmare issue phones are for teaching and learning and behaviour.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cAlmost every pupil has a phone in their pocket, in their bag. They can\u2019t fight the neurological compulsion to check their phone to get that dopamine hit.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cAs one teacher I know puts it, it\u2019s as if we are trying to teach math in a casino full of cocaine, and then wondering why no-one can understand what we are saying.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Conservative councillor Chris Cowdy, who put forward the motion calling for a ban, said: \u201cIt\u2019s been over a year since the first table of a motion to ban mobile use at school.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cIt\u2019s already been delayed twice, so I am very relieved that we are here today. We have got this far, and there does appear to be a significant amount of consensus on the direction of travel.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Cllr Cowdy, like many other councillors on the committee, said that his view on banning mobile phones in schools had changed over time.\n<\/p>\n

\n SNP<\/a> councillor Finlay McFarlane said: \u201cI can\u2019t believe I\u2019m old enough to do it, but back in my day, the phones we had in high school, it was like paper text and polyphonic ring tones.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cAnd I\u2019ll admit, personally, that my views across this trial have changed. I was quite worried that we were taking a paternalistic approach to a ban and the other implications around that.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Most councillors supported a compromise position assembled by Cllr Dalgleish, but the Green group pursued a separate amendment.\n<\/p>\n

\n Earlier in the meeting, council education officer Linda Lees spoke on some results of discussions with students about the ban.\n<\/p>\n

\n She said many were amicable to it, but that some had concerns, citing the example of students who had bought their own phones rather than being given one being frustrated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The primary school ban is set to come at some point from November onwards, giving council officers time…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":394460,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8816],"tags":[748,1102,4884,712,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-394459","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edinburgh","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-edinburgh","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-scotland","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115140215611397118","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=394459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394459\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/394460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=394459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=394459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=394459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}