Everyday for five days a week students walk into school with one main goal which is to learn. In today’s world many students walk in with a constant fear. School shootings have become a well known event in the twenty first century. Instead of fixing the real problem, schools are more focused on banning cell phones. Students have a well earned right to have safety and a way to protect themselves and taking away phones only will make things worse.
Phones aren’t just for snapchatting your friends back and scrolling through TikTok if you get bored during class. In an emergency a phone is a lifeline. During a lockdown or shooting a student’s phone could be the only way to call 911, or alert their family. Schools should be working to make campuses safer and not removing one of the few things that help students feel protected.
“I would feel very scared, I probably wouldn’t come back for like a week,” Violet Hanlon said. “I think that the school is pretty safe and I think instead of having our phones in the phone chart I think it can be in my backpack for easy accessibility. ”
It’s very understandable that teachers don’t want students to be distracted on their phones and the teachers be ignored while they work hard on making a lesson plan. Instead of having a state law that you can’t have your phone during class or during the day. Schools should set clearer rules about when phones can be used. Like for example no phones during lessons, or during tests but allowed to have them during passing period, lunch or in an emergency. That way students can still stay focused during class but still be allowed if something dangerous happens.
“Safety is always the top priority. During an emergency, schools have well-established communication systems and procedures to quickly notify families and authorities. While it’s understandable that students might feel safer having their phones, our law enforcement agencies have guided us on how to respond in a crisis, and we depend on their expertise on when it is safe for students to call family members,” Dr Tieman said. “. Sometimes, phone use during emergencies can actually make the crisis worse by compromising everyone’s security, causing confusion, spreading misinformation, or overwhelming communication lines.”
The truth is, phone bans don’t solve the bigger problems. Students are still very unsafe. According to education week In just 2025 there have already been eleven school shootings that resulted in injuries or deaths with forty two people killed and injured. Also according to k12 last year there were thirty nine shootings of which is the second highest annual total on record with two hundred and sixty nine people wounded or killed. These numbers are showing schools are still under threat and students deserve to be protected and not restricted.
“The biggest distractions about phones are texting friends or watching videos or reels. There are cases where students use their phones for important work but it is most likely a text to a friend or family member. Putting our phones up makes most of us concerned and itchy because you never know what could happen in the next 5 minutes of class. Students should be able to have their phones on them, but not use them for emergency reasons,” Aubrey Otten said. “If a student is on their phone, I do think it should be taken. They should also put their phones possibly face down on the corner of the desk so the teacher can see them at all times but still in arms reach in case an important matter comes up”
Students shouldn’t have to choose between feeling safe and following school rules. If schools truly care about their students’ safety they need to focus on preventing huge tragedies and not punishing their students by carrying something that could save them or their peers. Until the number of school shootings stop going up, phones shouldn’t be banned. At the end of the day phones aren’t the real problem but school shootings are.
