At the beginning of this school year, Mr. McFarland recommended that teachers at MHS start implementing “No Phone Zones” in the classroom. It is where students have to put their phones in a specific pocket, with the screen facing the wall, for the entirety of the hour. The goal is to reduce distractions in the classroom, and the amount of trouble caused by students being on their phones.

The teachers all enforce this in their own ways, some not enforcing it at all. The students have a range of responses, a majority of them negative. The teachers and administration have faced many problems with this, and received a lot of backlash. When asked how she felt about the new implementations, Sally Boese, Junior, had this response: “I don’t like it. Instead of taking away our stuff, teach us that being attentive in class is our own responsibility, and we have to face the consequences for it. Like in college, they won’t take away your phone. If you want to be on your phone and get a bad grade, that’s your problem.” I agree with this statement. High-school teachers say they are preparing you for college, but treating us like middle schoolers isn’t exactly the best way to do so.

Not only that, but this causes a mistrust between students and teachers. At the beginning of the year when you’re starting to get to know your teachers, the first thing you don’t want to hear is “put your phones up here in your own assigned pockets for the rest of the class”. It makes students irritated, and might even make them not respect the teacher, or not want to listen to what they say. “No one wants to put their phone up, it’s our personal item. Not only that, but someone could steal your phone or pick the wrong one up,” says Hannah Wilson, sophomore.

The reasoning behind the implementation is good, but it doesn’t serve any purpose if it doesn’t fix the problem, or ultimately cause more.  Megan Manning, senior, said “It is good for learning self control, but it shouldn’t be forced. Mr. Corcoran has it where if you keep your phone put away in your  backpack for the whole semester, you get extra credit. And I think that’s a really good system because it’s our own decision, and it’s also a reward system, so kids actually want to do it.”

The way things were before were completely fine. The students have always had the option to keep their phones on them. Teachers have never wanted students distracted during lessons, but if they saw them on their phone they would tell them to put it up, or take it for the class period. Students still had their phones away when they had to, and if they didn’t they faced consequences, and never had to give up their personal belongings. It was always an easy system that us, high schoolers, have always been able to handle. This new implementation isn’t necessary, and has only caused more issues, more students getting in trouble for keeping their phones in their backpacks, and not much effectiveness. “I think they’re dumb. If you leave the classroom, someone could steal it. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t just be able to leave it in our backpacks,” says Katelyn Mintzer, freshman. I think we can all agree that no one likes to have their personal items taken away, and there are other ways to solve the problem.