Why on earth aren't students allowed to use cell phones at school?

Great question, that I hear from students weekly, and from time to time from a parent (sometimes angry) whose son or daughter has lost their handphone because they were using it in school.

Technically speaking, our school rules state that handphones are not permitted on school grounds. The reality, however, is that no teacher will go looking for a handphone if they don't see it, or hear it. The only time a handphone is taken is when it is seen or heard.

There are a few reasons why we have a "no handphone" rule, in no particular order:

1. School should be a place of interaction, conversation, and face to face dialogue. We are increasingly in a world where we (especially students) live "online" or "virtually". Communication after school and into the night is more and more via SMS, chat-rooms, email, messangers etc. If we were to "open" the school hours to allow handphones, many students would lose another time where they could/should be developing communication skills.
2. Handphones, in school, are a nuisance. How frustrated is everyone when a handphone goes off in a movie theatre? Imagine how frustrating it would be when handphones went off in the classroom.
3. Handphones are a target for theives. We are very lucky to have a (generally speaking) safe atmosphere in the school, one where students can interact without fear of their personal belongings being stolen.
4. Handphones get lost. We (the High School office) have spent hours tracking down "handphones that were stolen", only to find out that the student "dropped it on the bus" in the morning.
5. Globally (not at ISS) there is a huge problem of "handphone cheating". This is students using handphones during tests to get answers from their friends, who are outside. I recently read an article in Newsweek that said that soon the SAT exams, in the United States, will have metal detectors at the gates to remove all handphones to curb cheating. Again, this has not been a problem at ISS, but could always be if we are not careful.
6. We, from time to time, find cases where student A asks to leave class to use the toilet. On the way, student A sends an SMS to student B, saying "meet me in the canteen". This is frustrating, and disruptive to class.

There are other reasons, which I will post from time to time. In the meantime, students don't use your handphones in school and parents thank you for your support!

A few other general comments -

• It doesn't matter whose handphone it is, if a teacher spots someone using the handphone, it will be taken away even if the handphone was borrowed.
• The consequence for a first handphone offence is one week (with SIM card)
• The consequence for a second offence is up to one month.
• Immediate confiscation of the handphone has proven to be the single best deterrant (at all) to handphone use. Detentions, and other consequences, have not worked.