Cell Phone Bans Work: The Truth According To Paul

Hey, you know, School District 2 and school board members: What the heck more information do you need on cell phones and schools? Just ban them. Leave them in your car.

We gave you the information from Delta High School in Utah. They went from below national average test scores to above within one year after they banned phones. One year.

Parents themselves could even be part of the problem because they text kids during school hours with all kinds of stupid questions. How did you do do on a test, what do you want for dinner? Teachers say you can still reach your child if you have an emergency or change of plans because you just contact the front office. Worked fine for everybody.

Virginia High School teacher Joe Clement kept track of the messages. Parents have sent students who were sitting in his Economics and Government classes. Messages would say, “What did you get on your test?” “Did you get the field trip form signed?” “Do you want chicken for dinner tonight?” He's pleaded, “Stop texting your kids distractions. If it is not urgent, the message can wait.” One of the counselors said, “Think of it this way. If you came to school and said, hey, can you pull my kid out of Calculus so I can tell them something that's not important?”

This is coming from the teachers, folks, you know, they have all the pull. So why don't you listen to him? The school counselor tells parents you're contributing to the children's anxiety by sending them messages. You're tracking their whereabouts, you're checking their grades daily. Doesn't give kids the space they need at school to be independent and learn. He said teachers are even getting emails from parents after they give a test and they haven't even graded them yet before the class is over.

Children can't fine-tune their problem-solving skills. Some kids in school said it's helpful to reach out to our parents when we're feeling anxious or worried. Boo-hoo, reach out before you go to school and reach out after you go to school.

“I want to be able to reach my child at any time.” That's a parent's anxiety problem, not the child’s.

Beth Black, who's a teacher in San Francisco, said, “Maybe the parents should confiscate their child's phones, too.”

Cell phone holders, that's what School District Two tries. Great, and then the kids go out and they get their phone and I'm sure none of them look at them. Text anybody check, Snapchat, Facebook, all that bull crap between classes. You know, they do. Diverting their attention.

Forty percent of students, according to this teacher, have at least one earbud in when they walk in the class. So, they're listening to music while they're in class through their earbud. To prove just how distracting they are, this teacher ran an in-class experiment where he asked students to take their phones off of silent, and switch on notifications for two minutes. He said it sounded like an old-time video arcade in there, buzzing, dinging, ringing...two solid minutes.

School Board, School District 2 officials ban the phones. It's for safety. It's for the benefit of the student's grades. Ban the phone.

Their brain is elsewhere when their phone is buzzing, vibrating, pinging, doing whatever.

School District 2 and school board members, what more do you need? Every week, every week, we get one of these articles. Over and over, that gives you all the great things about banning cell phones, not letting them take them to school, banning them, not bring them in here, they can check them at noon when they go to lunch if that's what they want to do. They're there not to socially compete, not to socially interact during class. They're there to learn. You've got the results. You have the test scores to prove it. You have everything you need. All the information is right there.

Give me all the benefits of having cell phones in the classroom or in the hands of the students between classes every day. Where they then can take out their aggressions, do something nasty, text somebody, do this, do that. Gang members can coordinate. If you're worrying about gang activity, they can coordinate.

You know, you heard our school district officials talking about gang activity in our schools. Well, eliminate their way and communicating, eliminate their attire. The intimidation, all those kinds of things all can be done free, by the way, not spending one single penny, wouldn't you think we'd want to do all the free things first? And then see what we have left. Or do we do the money thing first and then after that, then do the free things?

I don't know, a lot of you people probably think I make this stuff up. This is from the most liberal organization on the face of the planet, Associated Press and this is where I get these stories every day.

Your own school Superintendent, Dr. Garcia, when he was with us, said he's not opposed to banning cell phones, right? He knows. School boards got the power to do it. Leave them in your car.