Attention, school kids: Using your cellphone during school hours can cost you.
Cell phones are generating some serious cash for Texas school districts.
It’s all because of students being fined for texting or chatting in the classroom.
The Texas education code lets schools fine students for violating cell phone polices.
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An open records search of school districts in the Houston area reveals Klein ISD collected the most money in cell phone fines. It collected $100,948 in just over two school years.
Klein ISD spokesperson Trazanna Moreno said the money is used to reward honor roll students for making good grades, maybe even a pizza party for a classroom that has done exceptionally well.
But that’s a lot of pizza, considering Klein Oak High School alone took in over $17,000.
Those are some seriously chatty students in KISD, I must say. At 180 school days per year and $15 a pop, that’s nineteen violations per day, every day, for those two years. That either means the kids there don’t learn their lessons very quickly, or the fine is set too low to have an effect on them.
We couldn’t find that kind of revenue collection at other school districts.
For example, Montgomery ISD took in less than $2,500 in the same time period.
That’s more in line with what I’d expect. Something is wacky in KISD, that’s all I can say.
Link via the DMN Crime Blog, which notes that Metroplex schools have been doing this as well. I must say, I don’t have a problem with this, at least as long as the fines are imposed for using the cellphones during school hours, not for merely having them on your person. With schools, there’s always the possibility of some kind of zero-tolerance insanity, but as long as that’s not the case, I say fine away.
Waco area schools do it as well. As a teacher I’m all in favor. Gets the kids attention. Also the parents. To claim a confiscated cell phone the parent has to come to the office and pay the fine. Lots of parents leave them there for weeks to teach the kids a lesson.
As a teacher I can tell you that kids these days are incredibly adept at no-look texting with the phone in their pocket. The will text each other answers to tests across the room. They can store cheat sheets on their phones. Not to mention the endless social stuff when they should be listening and working. You really can’t have phones in classes. If it were legal to put cell phone blockers in school classrooms I’d be all in favor.
And no, it isn’t a zero tolerance no possession thing. They can bring them out the minute the end of the day bell rings. They just cant have them out during school hours.
I was recently surprised to find out that kids these days are using cell phones in class, including texting – those as young as middle school (perhaps younger!?)… See, here in Illinois, the General Assembly outlawed cell phones in schools. But then, the State Representative who had sponsored that original bill sponsored another one, repealing that ban – pointing out that back when that bill was passed, cell phones were large and bulky. (She may also have mentioned that, in the more-recent atrocities, such as school shootings, cell phones became useful, for students.)
As far as I know, the repeal of the ban passed the Illinois General Assembly.
I remember being one of the first people to have a cell phone (in my junior year of high school… Wait, I remember my parents having one, even earlier than that – But it was in junior year that I got my own ~ That caused some problems, though, insofar as charges! ;-). The thing is, they were much-more expensive back then, as well.
The teacher who was the sponsor of Student Council mentioned that (after a Council member used one) having a cell phone on school property was a 10-day suspension… It was not enforced, in that case, but that put fright in my mind – One day, when they were checking lockers (and wouldn’t let us out of class), I was terrified, because I had left the pocket of my bookbag open, right in there, with the cell phone in it.
This was my last semester of high school (Spring 1999), and nothing came of the cell phone issue – The school authorities were more-concerned with other things, at that time.
The school had also instituted very-strict guidelines, on what we could do and carry, during that scary time period. (I hope they’ve eased up on that, since then.)
I am glad that public school students (in District 186) are now allowed to carry cell phones, on school property, without fear of repercussions. (Then again, I don’t know if that’s officially the case – I hope the state legislature has repealed that law, but I don’t know what the school district’s rules now are. Considering how common cell phones now are, I hope they’ve relaxed the rules.)
But I am somewhat-surprised that the young ‘uns are texting in class! (Kids these days!… 😉