BINGHAMTON, N.Y. (WBNG) — The morning bell has rung on Governor Hochul’s cell phone ban in public schools. Starting this year, students across New York state will be prohibited from cell phone use throughout the school day.
Around the Southern Tier, schools like Owego Free Academy and Principal Phil Schofield have been figuring out how to facilitate these policies.
“We’ve been preparing for this for over a year now,” Schofield said. “We knew a lot of neighboring schools that have been going down that road, understanding that the state was going to be coming out with some pretty strict guidelines.”
To ensure state policies are being followed, several schools are implementing new “Yondr” pouches to hold students’ phones throughout the school day.
“Students are assigned a Yondr pouch; they enter with some staff who is there watching them enter the building, putting their phones in their pouches,” Schofield said. “They remain locked throughout the day, and at the end of the day, we have unlock stations spread out throughout both the middle school and the high school.”
Students we spoke to at Binghamton High School said so far, the ban is working exactly as the Governor intended.
“I get why they banned the phones, because kids weren’t really concentrated, not me, really either,” said Malik Al-Sarman. “Ever since the phone ban, I’ve been concentrating a lot more in school, trying to focus on my life. Trying to be a better me.”
Others, while understanding the necessity for these changes, see the rule of no phones through the school day to be too much.
“Especially with seniors, they want to photograph what they’re doing and stuff,” said Layla Dimon. “But they can’t, because we can’t have phones.”
“We have family and parents too,” said Kamari Goodman. “God forbid something happens to them while we’re in school, we have no way to know about that. I feel like there’s things we can do to make it not so harsh.”
Schofield said students can come to the office to use their phones to make a phone call if it is needed, and parents can call the main office if they need to contact their child.
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