By Lindsey Lolkema
The start of the 2025-26 academic year kicked off with a new policy for many K-12 school districts across the country: a cell phone ban. To diminish distractions in the classroom, 27 states have enacted laws restricting student cellphone use. Of those, 18 have “bell-to-bell” bans, meaning no phones are allowed throughout he school day, including lunch and study hall.
In New York, Gov. Kathy Hochul passed the “Distraction-Free School” law in May last year, banning the use of smartphones and other internet-enabled personal devices.
The East Meadow District took measures to tailor the state’s specifications to best meet the district’s needs, resulting in a variety of feedback from students, teachers and parents. While many responses have been encouraging, officials said, several people are still learning how to navigate the ban.
“We’re enforcing what they gave us,” Superintendent Kenneth Rosner said. “We understand the need for parents to try to get access to their children, and at the same time to have a distraction-free school. I think we found the right balance.”
East Meadow’s secondary students are required to store their devices in their lockers, while elementary students are discouraged from bringing devices to school. Officials at each school are responsible for sending letters to families, detailing how students can contact their parents during school.
Many parents say they must accept their children are no longer accessible during all hours of the school day.
Jennifer Melnick, who has three children, 10, 13 and 15, in the East Meadow School District, said it was challenging to overcome what she called “instant gratification.” Before the ban, Melnick could immediately contact her children if necessary, offering a sense of safety. Now, she sees her children developing “problem-solving” as they find ways to communicate their needs through the school instead of texting her directly.
Melnick, a psychotherapist, also acknowledged that, from a mental health standpoint, there has been a “decline in social connections” caused by cell phones, calling them a “crutch” to avoid in-person contact. Now, without their phones, students are “forced to engage even in class.
“They’re not as inclined to look at their phone,” Melnick said.
Gina Godinho, who is both a parent to a 13-year-old East Meadow student and a teacher of 25 years, said she doesn’t think phones are necessary unless there is a true emergency like an intruder in a school.
“I wouldn’t expect my child to answer the phone during the day. So I was fine with it,” Godinho said. “It does force them to socialize and not be stuck on, you know, their phones playing games.”
Godinho was also troubled by certain behaviors that she saw as a literacy teacher at P.S. 159 Isaac Pitkin School in Brooklyn District 19 before the ban took effect.
Godinho described an issue with students taking pictures of other children while in the bathroom. One time, Godinho was recorded teaching by a fifth-grader.
Students have adapted their habits to follow the ban’s restrictions. Members of the W.T. Clarke Middle boys’ basketball team, all 12-year-olds from Westbury, shared their thoughts on a recent evening before practice.
“Before, I would probably call one of my parents to see if they could pick me up, but now I just kind of have to rely on other people. It’s just harder, I guess,” Frankie Fonte said. “The teachers are usually kind of chill about it because some people just bring it [a phone] to school, but don’t use it anyway.”
While many students stick to keeping their phones away, not all abide by the ban. One of the boys was recently caught taking his phone out during the school day.
“For my basketball team, we have a schedule out, and I didn’t know if we had a practice or not after school, so I was just trying to check and see if we had it,” James Monasterio said. “I was on my phone at lunch and a teacher told me to go to my locker and put it back.”
“I like the idea of my son having his phone, so if there’s an emergency, he can contact me right away. He doesn’t have to, like, run to his locker to get his phone,” said Jennifer Monasterio, James’ mother. “Well, honestly, like, I tell him to put it in his locker and check it, you know, while in between classes or at lunch.
“I understand where the teachers are coming from, because getting these boys and girls off their cell phones, it’s like the hardest thing on the planet, because they’re totally addicted to them,” Monasterio said.
When Jaxen Pesquira first learned of the ban, he thought it was “pretty dumb.”
“What if there’s a lockdown and, like, you need your phone to text your parents or something,” he said. Pesquira explained that some students still keep their phones in their pockets during the day.
When asked whether he believes the ban benefits learning or not, Pesquira responded, “I mean … class is pretty boring.”
Another player had a different opinion. “I feel like it’s kind of benefiting my learning and my focus. I don’t have to have a phone in my pocket … buzzing every five seconds,” Macceo Barry said. “It’s actually kind of nice.”
Educators are also adjusting to the ban.
At the start of the school year, Kaitlyn Melker, a W.T. Clarke High music teacher, worried about her co-workers being on the same page with the ban. “It has to be an all or nothing thing. Otherwise it’s going to lose effectiveness,” she said.
Melker had long asked that students put their phones away in her classroom, even before the ban. In the past, if she needed students to use their devices for a specific educational purpose, like taking a picture of a slide on the board or listening to a rehearsal track, she would grant special permission. She can longer do that.
“My frustration is actually in not being able to use it for certain educational purposes,” Melker said. “In the music world, I use the Remind app to communicate with my students, you know, ‘Lessons are canceled.’ I can no longer do that and expect them to listen to my messages because they’re not supposed to be on their phone,” she said.
Students must now rely on their Chromebooks. Godinho argued, “You don’t need a phone to look it up” because other devices such as iPads and desktop computers are available in school.
While Melker asks her students to use their Chromebooks, they are often met with kickback from website blockers preventing them from accessing the necessary materials.
“It’s so frustrating in some regards where I’m, like, I wish you could just use your phone,” she said.
Although frustrated at times, Melker reflected on cell phone use from the perspective of a millennial who grew up with equal parts phone use and no phone use.
“Students don’t know what it’s like to live without an attachment to their phones … I think it’s imperative that there’s some sort of shift and effort to make it where they do know what life is without their phones,” Melker said. “I think this is the first step toward doing that. I just think it’s going to take a hell of a lot longer than just three months.”
