School plans to consider ban on using smartphones

DEPUTY principal Mary Slattery has praised the move by Emmanuel Macron’s government to ban smartphones in schools, as her own school in Co. Tipperary is considering the introduction of an outright ban on smartphones being on the premises.

However, she is doubtful that the Government here will ever follow suit.

‘It’s wishful thinking probably on our part to think that the Government or a minister will do the work for us in a sense,’ she told the Irish Daily Mail. ‘I think they’re giving us the go-ahead to see what we can do about it.’

The use of smartphones is not allowed in Ursuline Secondary School in Thurles, where Ms Slattery teaches.

‘What we’re doing at the moment is we’re surveying parents to know how they would feel about an all-out ban in schools of mobile phones,’ she said, adding that the move followed a circular distributed by Education Minister Richard Bruton to all schools directing them to consult with parents and students on smartphone policy.

‘We’re getting a lot of positive feedback from the parents, saying that they would be happy to make the school a phone-free zone. If we don’t have the parents on board to support us then we won’t be able to implement it.

The deputy principal, who signed this paper’s petition for new laws around the minimum age of smartphone ownership, believes there should be ‘no question’ around primary school students having smartphones.