A move by the nation’s second-largest public school district to ban the use of cellphones by students is sparking conversations about whether Napa County schools should follow suit.
The Los Angeles Unified School District “beat us to it,” said Cindy Watter, president of the Napa Valley Unified School District board, adding that parents and teachers expressed interest in establishing a similar policy. Although the Napa district hasn’t held formal discussions on banning mobile phone use, informal conversations have begun.
“Several students have told us the phones, with easy access to social media, are distracting and depressing,” said Watter, a former Napa and American Canyon high school teacher.
In a news release, the Los Angeles school board said it issued its ban after reviewing studies that showed harmful effects of cellphone use in schools.
“Studies show that smartphones and social media are distracting kids from learning, eroding their mental health, and stifling in-person social connection,” the statement said.
While none of Napa County’s public schools currently prohibit students from bringing their mobile phones on campus, NVUSD spokesperson Julie Bordes said each school in the district — spanning more than two dozen campuses across Napa and American Canyon — is allowed to decide what restrictions work best for their students.
“Many of our middle and high schools share the expectation that student cellphones are to be out of sight and kept in student backpacks during the regular school day,” said Bordes. “We continue to explore the need for a districtwide policy on this important topic.”
According to a March 2023 board presentation in the St. Helena Unified School District, “the use of a cell phone, smart watch, pager or other mobile communication device during instructional time or in an unauthorized manner in violation of district policy” is described as prohibited student conduct.
Officials with the Calistoga Joint Unified School District were not available for comment. The district’s website does not outline campus policies on mobile devices.
For two decades, teachers have had to adjust to more and more students spending more and more of their time on cellphones while in school.
Elizabeth Goff, who has taught school for 23 years and worked at American Canyon High School since it opened in 2010, remembers a time before students had mobile phones and were stuck talking to each other if they wanted to connect.
“I think cellphones have made school difficult not only for teachers, but for students,” she said. “Students won’t admit it. I think there’s a lot more conflict in schools because of social media and the constant pressure that kids are feeling because they’re always on their phone.”
Goff is concerned that, at this point, students might be too connected for their own good.
“It’s even gotten to the point where parents just assume they can contact their kids 24 hours a day,” she said. “And I don’t think it’s good for them. Kids need that bit of independence.”
Even as a matter of safety, Goff isn’t convinced that cellphones in class are always a good thing. For example, even if a parent needs to contact a child with a piece of life-changing news, it might be better to deliver it in person so the child doesn’t have to process it alone, she said. Or during a school lockdown, Goff tells her students to not text their parents.
“Number one, they’re gonna be extremely scared for you,” she said. “They’re going to come to the school, they’re gonna get in the way, and you’re going to have emergency personnel having to deal with parents instead of dealing with the emergency at hand.”
Goff noted that, at American Canyon High, cellphone policies are left to teachers’ discretion.
“In short of banning them, there should at least be more effective programs for teaching kids how to use them,” she said.
Students weigh in
Zoe Keller’s relationship with her phone is complicated.
Admittedly a bit checked out during her senior year at American Canyon High, she developed a habit of hiding AirPods under her long brown hair during some classes, and watching “Avatar: The Last Airbender” and other anime shows.
One day during her sophomore year, Keller’s father called her during class to break the news that her mother had died. Since then, she’s worried about what she would do in an emergency if she didn’t have her phone.
“I don’t fully think they should ban phones completely,” she said. “I know some schools make you put your phone in a cubby in the classroom. I like that idea.”
Despite the benefits of entertainment and connection, Keller said, her phone, and the social media streaming through it, have taken a toll on her mental health.
“It caused me to compare myself to other people I see and what they’re doing,” she admitted. “It gives me a lot of FOMO (fear of missing out).”
Alana Williams, who also graduated from American Canyon High last month, said her use of social media at school has led to distraction and anxiety.
“There was a while where I was so obsessed with curating the perfect (Instagram) feed and trying to make my posts nice and profile look nice to get more followers,” Williams said. “That stressed me out so much that I had to stop using Instagram altogether for like a year.”
Williams’ mother, Kim Williams, who has taught at Sonoma State University for 27 years, was also concerned about her daughter’s cellphone use at school.
“I know it was not good for my daughter, my youngest (Alana) especially,” Kim said. “I just saw her spending so many hours on it. Hours upon hours, the time-sucking nature of it.”
Kim Williams teaches English and American Multicultural classes at Sonoma State, which are general education classes for students usually right out of high school, and has seen the impact of smartphones in classrooms at the college level.
“It doesn’t allow them to pay full attention to what’s going on,” she said. “It shortens their attention span. It’s unhealthy because there’s a lot of judging on social media.”
Kim Williams said she’s seen a steady decline in reading proficiency among her students, and said although Alana is now moving on to higher education, she would support an NVUSD cellphone ban “110%.”
Momentum growing
The conversation around cellphone usage, social media and student mental health has been growing and intensifying for years.
Starting in 2023, a series of lawsuits — modeled after the Big Tobacco cases of the 1990s — was filed by 45 state attorneys general, accusing Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, of knowingly developing products that would lure young people down rabbit holes of harmful content.
In June, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called for warning labels on social media platforms, similar to those on cigarette packaging, because of the mental and emotional harm they pose to children and teenagers.
In California, lawmakers are starting to take notice of the effects of cellphones on learning. Assembly Bill 3216, which has the backing of Gov. Gavin Newsom, would require local school officials to limit or prohibit the use of mobile phones at school except in specific circumstances.
In Napa, Anthea Johnson, a substitute teacher, said she has seen a negative impact of cellphones on even basic academic progress.
“The amount of illiteracy is astounding,” she said. “I was watching kids Googling on their phone how to spell words, because they’re so used to autocorrect doing it for them.”
Still, she isn’t convinced a ban would work. She said Napa schools have been trying to crack down on cellphone use since she graduated from Vintage High School in 2018.
“Kids are crafty,” she said. “They pull all the tricks in the book, and I know most of them because I pulled them too.”
Watter, the Napa school board president, agreed that enforcement would be a key challenge to implementing a cellphone ban.
“It sounds to me as if LAUSD made the decision and is now figuring out how to implement it,” she said. “Knowing how to implement it would help me make a decision.”
Riley Palmer covers government and education for The Napa Valley Register. rpalmer@napanews.com The Register is a partner of The Intersection and CVJC.
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