The Kenai Peninsula Borough School District’s Board of Education is seeking to make the district’s cellphone policy stricter. At a Nov. 5 work session, the group asked their policy committee to create new policy language that would prohibit use of any personal devices by all students at any time of the day, for consideration at a future meeting.

KPBSD Superintendent Clayton Holland told the board during that work session that the district’s existing policy says that “personal electronic devices” — including cellphones and laptops — should not be “turned on or used in any way” during classroom instruction unless with direct supervision and approval from the teacher. The policy was adopted on Oct. 14, 2013, and says that devices “serve an important purpose” to facilitate communication between a student and their family, also as tools to access information. Their use is permitted as long as it doesn’t “interfere with the educational process or with safety and security.”

The policy says that, without permission, devices cannot be used during class or other “school sponsored and supervised group activities.” Students are prohibited from accessing blocked websites, using their devices to bully or harass another person, using cameras or recording devices in various illicit ways or otherwise performing illicit activities.

The policy says that high schoolers can use their devices before and after school, as well as at lunch, Holland said, while younger students can only use devices before and after school.

There are several schools that have adopted their own cellphone policies that are more restrictive than the district policy, including Skyview Middle School, Nikiski Middle/High School, Kenai Alternative High School and Chapman School. Holland said those schools are seeing “a world of difference.”

At the top of the discussion, board member Kelley Cizek said that their conversation was ultimately about deciding “how draconian do we want to be?”

Student representative Emerson Kapp several times pointed to issues with the current policy that should be shored up rather than exploring options like the Yondr bags. The bags can only be opened using a magnetic unlocking station at the school’s office or by entrances.

Kapp said that teachers are lenient with phones and create a culture where they are openly used in classrooms, that teachers themselves are constantly using cellphones, and that Yondr bags can’t account for all the devices, and sever all the means of connection available to students.

“We need to keep in mind that students have other things going on,” Kapp said. “Not everything can wait until after school.”

The board repeatedly discussed the possibility of using Yondr bags as part of a revised policy, which would contain student cellphones, keeping the phones in student’s possession but unusable.

Several members, including Patti Truesdell and board vice president Jason Tauriainen, said they favored the use of Yondr bags because it removes the need for teachers to police phone use. Tauriainen said that, if the existing policy were to be better enforced, it would potentially require disciplining teachers who “can’t seem to manage keeping kids off their phones during the day — “that’s a bummer place for that teacher to be in.”

“Yondr bags are the answer,” Tauriainen said. He wants to see “something drastic” done about phones, because he says that the potential harms of phones in the classroom “far outweigh” any of the benefits.

“Half measures have availed us of nothing,” Truesdell said, speaking in favor of developing a stricter policy. “We’re in the business of educating these kids. One of the things we keep getting slammed about is whether our students are, in fact, getting the best education.”

Despite extensive discussion, the board came to no final decision on whether or not the district should use Yondr bags. Questions remain about how much it would cost to implement them throughout the district, and Holland suggested potentially running a pilot study using the bags at certain schools before possibly later implementing more broadly.

The district can further explore adding Yondr bags, Holland said, “at a different time.”

Member Virginia Morgan wondered whether any action the district could take would really mitigate the use of phones in the schools.

“At some point, we all have to decide that it’s just not cool to be on our phones — that’s when it will fix the problem,” Morgan said. “All the kids are all going to be on their phones — no matter if they’ve been restricted or not.”

Cizek said that, especially when it comes to the heavy use of phones by students outside of class or at home, the district’s responsibility is instead to “focus on what they’re doing in class — are we giving them the best opportunity, the best chance to be educated?”

“I think it’s time for a change,” board president Zen Kelly said. “I think phones should be banned in schools. K-12, from the starting bell to the ending bell. Through passing periods and through lunch times.”

Arguments about parent communication with students or use during an emergency are unconvincing, Kelly said. Parents can call offices or use other methods of contacting their children. In emergencies, he said, “that’s not the time to be distracted by a phone.” Instead, that’s the time to listen to authorities.

Holland, too, said he’s in favor of making a change. He said that his job is to improve district results — and cellphones are causing distractions in the district classrooms.

Kelly called for the KPBSD Board of Education Policy Committee to author a proposed change that can come before the school board in the near future. The policy he described would prohibit use of any personal devices by all students at any time of the day.

Kapp was the only member to voice opposition to that direction. Members Penny Vadla, Dianne MacRae and Morgan, though, said they weren’t necessarily in favor of the change without seeing further input from students and the final policy language.

“I feel uncomfortable making a policy change on this that is so drastic without including more student voice,” Morgan said. “I really do think their perspective is important here, and I think that we would be stronger coming up with a policy if we were to work together.”

Others were more decisively in favor of change.

“Some people aren’t going to like it, but we are going to do it,” Truesdell said.

A full recording of the work session is available at the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District’s BoardDocs website.

Reach reporter Jake Dye at jacob.dye@peninsulaclarion.com.