SABRINA REN<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
We\u2019re suspended for sexual harassment, drug possession, and now\u2026 for using cellphones? It\u2019s 2010, and the \u201cWhen I was your age, I didn’t have a computer or a flushable toilet\u201d arguments really don\u2019t apply anymore. Schools need to accept that cellphones have become a crucial part of our lives, for better or for worse, and suspension is the exact opposite of a solution. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Mrs. Laszlow was seen leaving the French department NT Je T\u2019aime film festival with an armful of at least a dozen phones. That was a reasonable punishment, since students should have been paying attention to each other\u2019s films, and there had been a reminder at the beginning of the assembly. Texting friends about lunch plans during class would definitely be reason enough for a warning or confiscation, and is a habit that should be broken. But what about at lunchtime and afterschool? With the wealth of extracurriculars that NT offers, what\u2019s wrong with calling to ask a teammate where the game is or if the rehearsal has been cancelled?<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Mr. Hobson speculates that the ban has to be harsh in order to draw the line far enough to cover all the gray areas. However, whether or not the ban includes phone use after class, I continue to use my phone between classes. Tracy He points out, \u201cAt lunch, I always check the time on my cell to make sure I can get to class on time. There aren\u2019t that many working clocks in the school.\u201d I don\u2019t text during class because I should focus on the teacher, but there\u2019s no reason I shouldn\u2019t be able to use my phone afterschool. A student was volunteering at the school a few months back, and took out her phone (likely to tell her parents how happy she was to be giving her time to a good cause). A teacher spotted it, swooped down and confiscated the phone. Martin Laws points out that, in the real world, there\u2019s no such thing as a phone ban throughout a company, but, of course, no one texts during a meeting. Students should grow up and stop texting during class, but schools need a better way of dealing with the situation (and not with an illegal cellphone signal jammer, as a principal in British Columbia used). <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Phones are even banned on school trips, which is almost laughable. On a recent trip to Montreal, students each received a list of rules, including no cellphones. We piled on the bus, and the first thing we did was fill out a list of every student\u2019s cell number. On an Anthro trip last year to different neighbourhoods of Toronto, students exchanged cell numbers with our teacher so that we could call her once we completed our tasks. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n After a talk with our trustee Josh Matlow (on my cell phone, on school property), I learned that while the TDSB policy is to turn cellphones off in school, it is not “a cellphone ban”\u2014and that most importantly, the principal has the power to change this policy as they see fit. \u201cThere needs to be flexibilities to this,\u201d says Matlow, who actually initiated the policy. If it\u2019s the night of fashion show and a designer needs to be located asap, is there any logic behind sending a fashion show executive to the office? The reasons for the phone policy\u2014privacy and classroom focus\u2014don\u2019t apply in this case. As an unnamed teacher said, other students aren\u2019t allowed to use their phones and special privileges wouldn\u2019t be fair.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n \u201cOur entire society is not sure on how to control this technology,\u201d Matlow says, \u201cand there\u2019s no reason there can\u2019t be a fair discussion to find a respectful way to compromise on afterschool activities.\u201d Students don\u2019t have the right to make their own rules, but the current cellphone regulations aren\u2019t working, and there needs to be a better solution. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Suspension is going in the opposite direction of a solution: students would be punished for no purpose. \u201cI think that the reason for the cellphone ban in the TDSB is to prevent cheating and disruptions in the classroom, but suspending kids for having a cellphone in school is far more disruptive to somebody\u2019s education than five seconds of ringing or a text message,\u201d Martin argues. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Students realize that people were fine back when cellphones didn\u2019t exist, but people can be better now that they do. During class time, the consequences outweigh any benefits, but outside of that time, cellphones are far more useful than disruptive. To put it simply: \u201cIt\u2019s just a really stupid reason for suspension,\u201d said Tracy He. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/span><\/span>Good morning Mrs. Thompson, your son has been suspended because he was talking to you on his cellphone.<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" SABRINA REN We\u2019re suspended for sexual harassment, drug possession, and now\u2026 for using cellphones? It\u2019s 2010, and the \u201cWhen I was your age, I didn’t have a computer or a flushable toilet\u201d arguments really don\u2019t apply anymore. Schools need to accept that cellphones have become a crucial part of our lives, for better or for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":382,"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216\/revisions\/382"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graffiti.ntci.on.ca\/2009-10\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}