Right now school districts in Utah can choose whether or not they want to ban cellphones. If state lawmakers have their say, all districts will have to implement bans during school hours.
Cellphones are already banned at Granger High School in West Valley City.
As thousands of students leave for the day, each pulls a gray pouch out of their backpack or pocket. They find a staff member stationed outside to unlock it using a magnetic circle.
Inside is the precious phone the students haven't been able to access since their first class that morning.
Republicans Sen. Lincoln Fillmore and Rep. Douglas Welton drafted a bill for the 2025 legislative session that would make the Granger student experience more common.
Rather than leaving it as an open choice, the bill makes it the default that cellphones and smart devices, including smart watches, are banned during school hours. Districts would then have the option to create a more permissive policy that allows phones if that’s what their community desires. However, the policies would still have to ensure the devices don’t “interfere with the learning environment,” according to the bill.
“The learning environment is no longer as focused as it was. Distractions are too present,” Fillmore said at an Aug. 26 news conference at Granger. He called the high school a “leader in the state” for how it handles cellphones.
“Cellphones, especially internet-enabled cellphones, smartphones with social media, are damaging to the learning environment and to our kids' health.”
Lawmakers are once again collaborating with The Policy Project, a nonprofit organization, to pass and fund the proposed legislation. In the past, the group has successfully worked with lawmakers to mandate free period products in schools and secure funding for teen centers in Utah’s high schools.
Like those initiatives, the cell phone bill would include a private-public partnership to fund it.
“We will work to ensure there's funding available for schools to purchase needed technology or physical interventions to support the students and teachers as they work to break the habit of smartphone use in class,” said Emily Bell McCormick, president of The Policy Project. That could include things like the pouches used at Granger High.
The draft bill allocates $4.85 million. McCormick said the state would contribute about $3.5 million in one-time funds and the rest would come from donors.
“We've lost enough of our kids' attention and emotional energy and ability to learn to this epidemic. We should have acted 10 years ago. We should have acted five years ago. But we will act now,” McCormick said.
This is not the first time the Utah Legislature has talked about banning phones in schools. But it’s something that more and more states are starting to do.
A 2023 attempt died in its first committee. That bill, however, did not provide funding nor did it allow districts to set more permissive policies. There’s also more community support around this latest effort.
Earlier this year, Gov. Spencer Cox sent a letter to school districts encouraging them to remove phones during class time.
If the bill passes during the next legislative session, it would go into effect at the start of the 2025-2026 school year.
Granger High, which is in the Granite School District, just started using the pouches at the beginning of this school year. Before their first class of the morning, students show their teacher that their phone is off and locked in the pouch. They keep the pouch with them all day but can’t access it until 2:10 p.m. when the last bell rings.
As expected, Principal Tyler Howe said students are still mourning over not being able to access their phones. But after almost two weeks, he said students are starting to get used to the routine.
Cameron Black, a 17-year-old senior, is all for phones being off and put away during class time. He said teachers work hard on their lessons and when students have their phones out “that’s just plain disrespect.”
In the short term, Black said this new system is hard for students because they’re so used to being on their phones.
“But in the long run, it's gonna hopefully turn our future society back to being a normal society, instead of like what we're seeing recently.”
Still, he wishes he could have his phone during lunch when he likes to take a break, play games on his phone and regroup before his next class.
Even though it's early in the school year, Howe said they’ve seen “major changes in our school.” Some teachers have already told him they are getting more done in class.
“They're getting ahead of schedule because there's just not the same level of distractions,” Howe said.
Another sign that things are working is in the lunchroom. Howe said it's noisier because students are engaging more with each other instead of their devices.
He called it a “good noise.”
