At least one Kansas district is projecting $150,000 to $180,000 just to equip secondary students with individual phone lockers, according to the Wichita Eagle. The state provided zero dedicated funding. Every dollar comes from local budgets.
Districts choosing fabric locking pouches — think Yondr, the magnetic-lock system concert venues use to keep audiences present — face an estimated $30 per unit. Statewide, the Kansas Division of the Budget put that figure at roughly $13.4 million if every student received one, according to the Lawrence KS Times. Lockers require a steeper upfront investment. Neither option came with a state check attached.
Legislators passed the policy. The price tag was someone else’s problem.
This is how the kids know they are not in an institution of learning, but a prison for the crime of being juvenile.
What we’re also not going to hear is how often devices are misplaced, confiscated without return or just dissappear like socks in a dryer.
I’m seeing alot of comments about how this will or won’t work for how much the price is, but this made me think of something else.
Don’t we give kids chromebooks/devices anyway. I assume the point of these lockers is to force kids to pay attention, but chromebooks are waaaaaay worst than any phone a parent gave them.
You can threaten a kid to take their phone away, but you can almost argue you can’t take the chromebook away because that’s where all their assignments, tasks, books, notes, etc are all stored. And from my experience, people were always goofing off on other sites or playing games. Unless the school is able to monitor and lock down those chromebooks (which if we’re being honest, have the bare minimum of parental controls), then this is just throwing money at a fire instead of, I dunno, paying teachers better to actually help kids learn instead of moderating their tiktok addictions
There are webfilters for all edu devices… Except Windows 11 SE and that’s because the hardware can’t even run the OS.
But fr… At least Chromebooks are easy to lock down if gadmin and 3rd party filters are set up.
Decoy phone lol
Don’t say that. Then they’ll buy another safe for the decoy phones.
Bring two phones. Problem solved.
The problem of being distracted in class can be solved by having two phones? Weird!
Freedom or fascism.
What do you mean to say? It’s not clear to me.
I don’t know if I am supposed to be angry about this or not. Someone tell me if I’m supposed to be angry!
Seems like a straightforward solution to a simple problem. Pretty direct correlation with kids having access to smartphones vs declining grades and attention spans.
In schools that have started simply not allowing phones in class, grades have improved. This seems like the next logical step. Its basically just returning to pre-smartphone days. Schools used to confiscate phones if you had them out at all during school hours.
People will disagree with simple solutions, but those are often the ones that works. Phones cause problems, get rid of phones. Simple and direct.
Are there any studies that link phone use inside schools to those issues? Because I can easily believe that declining grades could be attributed towards the use of tablets and laptops being used in classrooms as well which many schools are encouraging or increasing the use of.
As for attention spans I would believe it’s for the use of phones/tablets/electronics from a young age rather than the use of them inside of a school itself.
Schools are scared to death of kids recording their staff being stupid, and each other. Legal liability/parental outrage. They block both phones and smart watches. If it were just a usage problem, they could have done what we always do and only take things away when they’re an issue.
Since the advent of phones, this hasn’t been a real problem.
My son’s school collects them at the classroom door if they have them out, or ignores it if they’re in their bag as long as they don’t make noise. - free
Kansas, who is already horrible at maintaining educational budgets to a self-destructive degree wants to spend 150k of (likely unwilling) taxpayer money to provide fancy lockers for phones that could be solved by leave it in your bag and off, if we find it on or it makes noise, you get detention.
It’s a stupid waste or resources and time.
if 0 is the Byrds Turn Turn Turn and 10 is RaTM bulls on parade, maybe go 6 or 7
It’s likely also plain corruption, just lawmakers creating ways for their friends to siphon money from government budgets with useless gadgets like this.
150k is for a single district, statewide they plan to waste millions on this
Internet rage confusion :D
Fantastic news, I’m glad they’re proactively seeking solutions
This is just to promote Musk Neurolink.
Wouldn’t it be cheaper if they have them magnet pouches
They could just leave them at home. I mean that worked just fine literally forever until these last two generations.
But, since both parents and kids are now addicted to the damn things, no one can imagine not having one in their hand for more than five minutes.
That requires an honesty system and kids aren’t honest
And cooperative parents
Some aren’t. You’d be surprised how far you can get by talking to teens like equals.
Well it’s the bad few eggs that ruin it for everyone
When your phone is your GPS and radio, no. I was in band, and some days we wouldn’t leave school afterwards because we’d be going to a game across the state. After the game, my mom would want to know where I was, which was usually Waffle House with a dozen others.
Worked so well, let’s avoid looking at the states of the world… Just install parental control and look the phone during their school time like a fucking responsible parent…
Or better yet, teach your kid responsible usage and live them alone.
Man, you can’t even teach adults that.
I tought people computers for some time. As long as there is some motivation, you can teach an 80 years old violin teacher to patch Linux drivers and recompile kernel.
Seem legit, didn’t take in account that kid dont’ hâve a fully developed brain and capitalists know that and exploit that. Sure be a good parent and let capitalist pedo teach your kids without supervisions, what a great idea.
You might be loosing a grip here a bit
Why because I don’t want n d to be influenced and broken by FB and other crazy shit ?
It worked, but not well. I remember standing in line for 20 minutes waiting on the one phone to call my parents so they knew my after school activity was done. (while other students were calling their parents).
It is long past time cell phones started to be regulated in schools. (And nationwide, but that’ll never happen.)
BUT…
…what gets me is the money angle here. Can anyone out there help me understand why a temp-use cell phone locker is $180,000? To me, this just screams government malfeasance, and I’d bet someone involved in the passage of this bill either owns a company or took a bribe from the company that wants to sell $180,000 cell phone lockers that people are forced to buy.
All government agencies get gouged. It’s absurd.
Followed some links and did some googling. The school district in question is USD-261 in Haysville, Kansas. The high school should have about 1800 students, so they would need 67 of these cell phone lockers. The price for 6+ is $1510, but let’s knock another $110 off since they’re buying 11 times that many, so $1400. That’s $93,800, for just the high school, and that’s before we talk about where the hell you’re going to put 67 of those things, and who you’re going to pay to install them and do any necessary renovations to accommodate them.
I’m probably going to make a YT video on this later this week.
Do you mind if I use this info? Happy to credit you, just message me how you’d like it attributed and if you want me to shout anything out for you.
Go for it. I don’t need any recognition or anything. A couple disclaimers:
1 - I’m not from the area in question, but I work in the public sector overseeing spending, so I thought it was an interesting exercise in understanding the scale we end up dealing with. So my comment is just a demonstration. None of this is actual information about the specific school district’s plans. I’m assuming they must be getting their lockers even cheaper than the ones I found with a quick search, because with my numbers you’re blowing past $180k pretty quickly once you scale it up to the whole district.
2 - I used this site for the student population. I didn’t cross-reference it or anything, so I have no idea how accurate it is. It states 5788 total enrollment, with 31.2% at Campus High School, so that’s where I got the 1800 students. It looks like the district serves multiple southwestern suburbs of Wichita, which makes a little more sense since the total population of Haysville itself is under 12k.
The 180k price tag seems to be for the outfitting of the school district and not just one school.
They say that Kansas City spent 150k and that’s presumably one of the largest in the state.
It’s also 180K for a 15-20 year refresh cycle. These are commercial units that are used in harsh environments… not a cabinet you buy once and it sits in your bedroom.
Add in wiring plus the install costs and $180K seems like a good deal
Wiring for what? It’s a locker…
“Used in harsh environments” like a middle school office where it gets opened twice a day?
Slammed twice a day for 20 years but probably kept there for 40+ if it’s like my schools as a kid.
Some of the desks at my highschool were older than any of the teachers there.
100% behind phone lockers, but, I do agree the price seems too high for this specific implementation. Looks like those hold ~250 phones each and I’m going to guess should cost $500-$1,000 per locker. A school should only be spending $5k-50k on these lockers.
Right?
$180,000 is absolutely insane. You could literally just get a lockable file cabinet from the 80’s or something and put each phone in its own file folder a few hundred.
It’s for the entire district, and the costs don’t seem that high to me.
14000 slots for students means it’s $12.86 per student over (typically) 20 years…
$0.64 per student per year seems reasonable.
This isn’t for one school, this is for the entire school district. Kansas City SD has 14,000 students across 33 schools. You also have to take into account paying for installation and shipping of 60 of those lockers.
Can anyone out there help me understand why a temp-use cell phone locker is $180,000?
Corruption.
It’s for the entire district, and the costs don’t seem that high to me.
14000 slots for students means it’s $12.86 per student over (typically) 20 years…
$0.64 per student per year seems reasonable.
They don’t want the next batshit stupid school shooting response to be so public.
How does this work, are all students required to put a phone in the locker? What about kids who can’t afford a phone?
And what about kids who get a second phone to put in the locker so they can keep their main phone?
Suddenly all the kids have old flip phones to deposit into the Phone locker.
What about kids who can’t afford a phone?
No phone = Nothing to deposit
And what about kids who get a second phone to put in the locker so they can keep their main phone?
Get rekt. Rules for the poor.
OK, then what about the kids who only have 1 phone but claim to have none?
Confiscation ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Sooooo exactly what happened two decades ago with phones and gameboys? This is so stupid. I got my phone confiscated a few times in high school and had to pay the school $15 or wait 15 days to get it back. Why is this not an option anymore?
Because parents are lunatics and administration is spineless.
Absolutely, yes.
Had my phone rooted and it suddenly crashed and rebooted mid-class blasting Titanium by David Guetta at full volume for it’s boot sequence.
I could get it back after the school day but I am still not over it >:(But yeah, just confiscate it and get it back after school is done.
Only if they get caught. Seems like a lot of money for a flawed system.
Get rekt. Rules for the poor.
I mean I’ve seen a lot more money wasted on much dumber shit.
Kids aren’t going to learn if they’ve got handheld social media internet gaming consoles with them in school. I wouldn’t have. They’re not going to willingly put them away for hours every day. I wouldn’t have. So…lock the fuckers up. These kids need to be educated so I’m not being taken care of by drooling Idiocracy background actors when I’m in end-of-life care. There’s way too much stupid going around already.
To be clear, 180k is too much. I’m just saying I agree with locking the goddamn things up.
I grew up with no portable electronics available at all, we also didn’t learn shit. If your topic is shit and your presentation is boring, kids would find how to ignore you. If it’s interesting, they will listen to you no matter how many smartphones they have. It’s hard, that’s for sure, but this infantilising bullshit makes it harder, not easier. You have to treat the kids like people, that’s the only way. Also you need to recognise that they aren’t adults, so you can’t expect them have hours of uninterrupted attention, smartphones or not.
“If you take your phone out you get detention.” I don’t see why this doesn’t work anymore. Do parents have no control over their kids anymore? You get detention twice, 3rd time suspended, suspended twice 3rd time expelled. If I got suspended from school for taking my phone out my parents would have simply taken away the phone.
I don’t see why this doesn’t work anymore. Do parents have no control over their kids anymore?
I think you just answered your own question.
Clearly we’ve reached the stage of physically taking and locking their phones up during school hours because verbal threats weren’t working. If parents had control of what their kids were doing when not in close proximity to them, this wouldn’t be happening.
Lot of dumb adults out there these days. I think a lot of parents would be on the “but I need to contact them in case of emergencies” and “you’re threatening my child’s rights” boat if they just floated the idea of suspension for phone use. So now we’re at the physically confiscate them upon entering like contraband stage.
I need to contact them in case of an emergency doesn’t mean the phone is out. Also the only emergency that matters is if the kid is in danger and needs to call someone. If Dad falls down a flight of stairs and breaks his neck you either A, go pick the kid up from school or B tell him when he gets out of school. The kid isn’t a paramedic.
Also kids don’t have rights at school. That’s why they have the ability to search all their lockers, backpacks, and vehicles without a warrant.
There is no law that says you have a right to have your phone in your hand, or it would be illegal to seperate us from them to go through metal detectors and such at airports, courts, etc
An emergency means the kids needs to call 911 not the parents need to contact the student. Most schools have a phone/intercom in each classroom which is close enough though. (Back in my day we did have to use this once when something happened, the teacher dealt with the main issue and assigned a student to push the button to alert the office. I wasn’t in that class so I don’t recall details)
If dad has hours to live you call the school office - you will need to sign them out anyway so they need to know. (plus they need to know because the school has counselors trained dealing with emotional issues like this who need to be at that school when the kid returns).
Which is to say I can think of no reason a kid needs a phone during class hours. They are sometimes useful after school hours.
So what do you do if the kid doesn’t lock up their phone at the start of the day and has it in class?
Back in my day you got stuck in detention or pulled from extra curriculars
Then do that if they pull their phone out during class.
“Do parents have no control over their kids?”
Almost never had. Control is an illusion.
Telling them they’re being controlled encourages innovations…so it’s kind of a fucked ouroboros
Kids have no hope these days. Who gives a shit if you get detention? It won’t change your future.
Getting expelled from a school most definitely should effect your future. Alternative schools have never been known to be fun. They also don’t usually have buses that come near you, so parents are going to hate having to drive you there, and if they aren’t going you wind up in a situation where the kid gets taken by child protective services, and that’s not a system that has great futures for kids either.
Caring about future wasn’t that popular among kids anyway, but when everyone kinda accepts that the future should be sacrificed on an altar of a line going up, it’s even harder to care. We’re going to burn last available resources and warm planet until we can’t grow crops anymore, so we can generate bad videos of Will Smith eating spaghetti. Who the fuck cares about long division or mitochondria when the most popular occupation in 2050 is projected to be “water refugee”.
Sure, it’s a doom scenario, it’s not guaranteed, we can somehow persevere, humanity always does. And even in the doom scenario It’s not impossible that we’ll conserve the civilization in some form.
What we have lost forever is the trust of our kids, that ship has sailed. When Greta Thunberg asked us not to destroy the planet, the collective response was mockery, anger, and pedo threats. There is a generational disdain bigger than it was for boomers.You still can work in an amazon warehouse with or without school, same like most basic entry jobs. When kids realise the market is dead and no amount of education will provide a career they will stop caring.
The job market is not dead. It is slightly down, but there are still a lot of jobs. There have been recessions before. History supports the idea that there will be a recovery in the near future, and then a few more years latter another recession.
Of course if you are the person without a job it does suck. However for the majority things are okay.
History never had the threat of a warming climate. A child starting school now will finish high school in what, 2038? We’ll be above 2 degrees warming by then. They’re in for a rough ride.
History has always had some threat. The exact threat has changed over time, but there was always something.
Why is 180k too much? I expect the school to be spending the money to buy something of quality that will last for a few years, and they likely have several thousand students. At $100 for each this would cover 1800 students. Even the $30 pouches mentioned only covers 6000 students - I would expect they have spares in each school.
In totally unrelated news, there is a trend of students starting to use older phone models.
Bring on the dumb phones, baby. Love it.
It doesnt look like returning the devices has to be immediate or convenient. Heres my proposed plan:
Ban devices entirely. Any item discovered gets confiscated, labeled, and placed in a bin in the office (achieving the “secure” location requirement of the bill.) Students are permitted to label their item. Items are available for pickup weekly at the end of a district-wide midday “value of education” parental education session.
Labelmaker: ~$200/school
Labels: $0.01/item
2 hrs labor weekly: 38×2×$50=$3800/district/year
Value of inconveniencing parents enough to care: priceless.
Banning phones doesn’t work.
Source: my high school
Banning sexual assault, bulling, rape and pedophilia doesn’t work either. Source: my secondary school.
Look valid, crappy idea. So now the director is responsible if a child is stuck somewhere and can’t reach it’s parents while going to school or coming from school.
They do it like me in ye olden days of the 2000s:
- Alert the teacher
- Go to the school secretary office and ask for the phone
That was before enshitification. They dropped pur kid at a random bus stop two weeks before the end os school, bus had issues, we had to go fetch them 2km away. They warned nobody and counted on kid to warn their parents… In this case you expect them to do what ?
Well in that case, you have to give the bus drivers rigorous training to reflect the cell phone policy. The bus driver absolutely should not have done that to your kid. That is not acceptable at all. However, that driver probably only did that because they knew your kid had a phone. If they instead knew that no kids in the school are allowed to have phones, they probably would never do something like that. It’s a giant legal liability for the bussing company.
Yeah look nice on paper.
I was expected to walk my own ass to school.
I did it by foot and bike.
And 2km is (depending on age) not much.A warnijg to impacted parents would be neat though.
It depends, really? 2km of well maintained sidewalks and walkable streets is very different from 2km of no sidewalks and unprotected highway crossings. The school I went to as a kid specifically banned walking home because we had the latter and a kid had got hit and killed because of it.
Lol I used to walk 2 miles home with limited sidewalks in the 2000s, everyone’s so fucking scared and lazy now.
Of course the US is not capable of creating sidewalks 🙄
So you expect rule from the 70th to apply in the 2020th ?
I am from the 2000s but k
