Oxford Hills students look back at a full year under a cellphone ban

Story by Jacob Murphy
April 14, 2026

Excerpt: " 'It's gotten easier. You get used to it. It's just like a new habit,' said Joseph Bobrowski, a sophomore at the school.

"Inside a world history class, students are working on a group project based on the Industrial Revolution. There were no phones in sight, which would have been unusual to see a year ago.

" 'Everyone would be on their phones, be it texting, gaming, but now there's a lot of people actually talking and laughing,' said Caelynn St. Laurent, a sophomore.

" 'It's kind of reminiscent of pre-cellphone, in terms of kids interacting with each other and just being kids, which is great,' said school principal Paul Bickford.

"It follows the logic of a new report from the National Bureau of Economic Research. The report tracks schools that use lockable pouches for phones, a system that was implemented at Portland High School."

Read more:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/public-safety-and-emergencies/health-and-safety-alerts/oxford-hills-students-look-back-at-a-full-year-under-a-cellphone-ban/ar-AA23egiT

#SmartphoneBan #LetKidsBeKids #BellToBell #TeenMentalHealth #MainePol #CellPhoneBans #PutThePhoneDown #SmartPhoneAddiction #TooMuchScreenTime #TechAddiction #LetKidsBeKids

I don't quite get #JanetMills. She vetoed the #DatacenterMoratorium, but passes a #CellPhoneBan in schools. 🤷🏼 I want to say, "Good for her," but...

#Maine public schools will soon be required to #BanPhones during school day

by Max Williams, WGME
Mon, April 13, 2026 at 8:48 PM
Updated Thu, April 16, 2026

PORTLAND (WGME) -- "By August 1, all Maine public schools will be required to ban phones for the entire school day.

" 'It's a distraction, and they are there to learn,' phone ban supporter Dan Melnick said.

"Signed into law as part of Governor Janet Mills' supplemental budget, it will allocate more than $300,000 to implement. The new policy is a '#BellToBell' policy, meaning phones are allowed on school property but cannot be used at any point during the school day."

[...]

"Experts say too much screen time has been linked to depression and, in some cases, suicide.

" 'It is very dangerous, because we're talking about people whose brains are not fully developed, and as it develops, it's creating certain neurocircuitry that is hard to undo,' Northern Light Acadia Hospital Medical Director of Pediatric Inpatient Services Dr. Nadia Mendiola said."

Read more:
https://wgme.com/news/local/maine-public-schools-will-soon-be-required-to-ban-phones-during-school-day-governor-janet-mills

#MainePol #CellPhoneBans #PutThePhoneDown #SmartPhoneAddiction #TooMuchScreenTime #TeenMentalHealth #LetKidsBeKids

HOLD THE PHONE: Aurora schools scrolling through student phone policies

'My students are more engaged and enabled to access learning without distraction'

https://sentinelcolorado.com/metro/hold-the-phone-aurora-schools-scrolling-through-student-phone-policies/

#AuroraCO #EDcolo #CellPhoneBans

HOLD THE PHONE: Aurora schools scrolling through student phone policies

'My students are more engaged and enabled to access learning without distraction'

https://sentinelcolorado.com/metro/hold-the-phone-aurora-schools-scrolling-through-student-phone-policies/

#AuroraCO #EDcolo #CellPhoneBans

About 4 in 10 #teens support #cellphonebans in #classrooms; fewer back all-day restrictions

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2026/01/13/about-4-in-10-teens-support-cellphone-bans-in-classrooms-fewer-back-all-day-restrictions

#Schools #Education #CellphoneBans #MentalHealth: "Our research found four studies that identified a slight improvement in academic achievement when phones were banned in schools. However, two of these studies found this improvement only applied to disadvantaged or low-achieving students.

Some studies compared schools where there were partial bans against schools with complete bans. This is a problem because it confuses the issue.

But three studies found no differences in academic achievement, whether there were mobile phone bans or not. Two of these studies used very large samples. This masters thesis looked at 30% of all schools in Norway. Another study used a nationwide cohort in Sweden. This means we can be reasonably confident in these results.

Mental health and wellbeing

Two studies in our review, including this doctoral thesis, reported mobile phone bans had positive effects on students’ mental health. However, both studies used teachers’ and parents’ perceptions of students’ wellbeing (the students were not asked themselves).

Two other studies showed no differences in psychological wellbeing following mobile phone bans. However, three studies reported more harm to students’ mental health and wellbeing when they were subjected to phone bans." https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/parenting4digitalfuture/2024/04/10/phone-bans/