Ban mobiles in school? Eton has a better answer

Gillian Keegan’s new guidelines to keep phones out of the classroom seem destined to fail, says Sean O’Grady – instead, she ought to listen to the elite school that came up with its own eminently sensible and workable policy

There is no actual detriment to a child being deprived of their mobile phone on the school estate (Getty Images)

I think I’ve now worked out what’s wrong with the government’s new guidelines on “banning” mobile phones from schools – they’re actually not guidelines at all. Or, at best, they are drawn so widely as to be virtually meaningless.

Gillian Keegan, still an education secretary on a quest for some gratitude from a callous public, has launched the umpteenth set of guidance on how to tame the scourge smartphone addiction among our young, but I don’t think a grateful nation will be overwhelming her with messages of thanks for her efforts.

Basically, the Department for Education is offering schools four options that, on the basis of some years of direct experience in the matter, they might just have worked out for themselves. Thus, the department suggests a range of options, all glaringly obvious: a) No mobile phones on the school premises; b) Mobile phone handed in on arrival; c) Mobile phones kept in secure location, which the pupil does not access throughout the school day; d) Never used, seen or heard.

Of course, being only guidance, schools can, if they like, do something else or, indeed, sod all. There are no real penalties or rewards for schools following the guidance. It’s up to them. As indeed it was always going to be because unless Keegan wants to recruit some sort of school smartphone Gestapo to patrol around the back of the bike sheds or gathering intelligence on the WhatsApp groups (where admittedly, the government has some expertise), it was always going to be a matter of discretion at the level of the individual school and the teacher dealing with a tricky dilemma in the classroom or corridor.

On the whole, a less permissive regime is probably the best channel to take. There is no actual detriment to a child being deprived of their mobile phone on the premises. The only advantage for today’s generation of “helicopter parents” is that they can get in touch with their kid in an emergency, and vice versa, But schools have been able to facilitate this with a message from long before the invention of the smartphone or even the dear old landline dog and bone.

When in doubt about the best way for a school to behave, I always turn to the policy pursued by Eton College, because why shouldn’t state school kids have the benefit of the best policy, if not the best of facilities?

The Etonians have an interesting approach which sounds like it has some merit. Up to the age of 14 or so, mobiles are outright banned because (even at such a distinguished intellectual hothouse) pupils that age are deemed not mature enough to cope with the new technology. But students in year 10 upwards are allowed their phones – but must also adhere to three “detox” days a week where they hand it in, with year 11s having one “detox” day.

Seems reasonable, if a little bureaucratic. But “rotating” phone days in this manner might well disable various online groupings and the associated bullying on social media.

At any rate, the Education department’s 11-page guidance document that says nothing at such great length does reveal the extent to which schools are subjected to what look to be entirely useless requirements to produce more policies and codes of conduct than the average Whitehall department, and yielding no obvious educational value.

It’s fair to point out that modern technology has brought its problems as well as its benefits for our young adopters – but life seems tougher for children, parents and schools than ever before. Mobile phones on school premises are as undesirable, in their different ways, as bladed weapons and vapes, and they need to be as restricted as possible, especially for the younger cohorts, just as they do at Eton.

Keegan has had a difficult start in her new job – the controversy about crumbling concrete has still not been resolved – but she really must do better.