{"id":70982,"date":"2025-12-15T12:51:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-15T12:51:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/70982\/"},"modified":"2025-12-15T12:51:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T12:51:11","slug":"how-new-yorks-phone-ban-saved-high-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/70982\/","title":{"rendered":"How New York\u2019s Phone Ban Saved High School"},"content":{"rendered":"

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When New York State banned phones in public schools from bell to bell this past September, the goal \u2014 according to the ban\u2019s champion, Governor Hochul \u2014 was undistracted learning. But within weeks of the Great Phone Lockup, teachers began to notice an incidental (and arguably even more compelling) benefit: The teens were talking to one another as if they were in a Brat Pack movie. Sure, there\u2019s been grumbling and some burner phones and scrolling in the bathroom. At one high school, an entrepreneurial senior even bought a pouch-unlocking magnet on Amazon and tried to charge classmates a dollar per jailbreak. But generally, with phones off-limits, the atmosphere feels different. There\u2019s a pleasant buzz in the lunchroom, chatter in the hallways, and an alphabet of new analog hobbies popping up just about everywhere. \u201cWe\u2019ve had a lot more school spirit,\u201d says Rosalmi, a senior at New Heights Academy Charter School in Harlem. \u201cPeople are more willing to do stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

What stuff are they doing? At many schools, teachers have made cards, board games, and sports equipment available during free time, and the kids have deigned to use them. Kevin Casado, a coach and teacher at Math, Engineering, and Science Academy Charter High School in Bushwick, hands out volleyballs every lunch period. He says a lot more kids are playing this year than were last year. \u201cIt\u2019s no net, open space, forming their own circles of ten or 12 kids, hitting it up to each other, an equal number of girls and boys,\u201d he adds. Aidan Amin, a ninth-grader at Hunter College High School, is in a friend group that congregates in the school foyer to stack OK Play tiles and compete at Sorry! and other tabletop games during lunch. \u201cI\u2019d say it\u2019s made us closer. Honestly, half the people I\u2019m playing board games with I didn\u2019t know at all before this,\u201d Aidan says.<\/p>\n

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At Rosalmi\u2019s school, dominoes rule the cafeteria. \u201cDominoes is really a staple Dominican game. People get passionate. You have to slam that first piece down on the table!\u201d she says, adding that there\u2019s trash talk \u201cbut it\u2019s game trash talk. It\u2019s really funny.\u201d About 11 miles south, at Brooklyn Technical High School, the name of the game is poker, the trash talk is (sometimes) in Russian, and instead of chips or cash, the kids bet with hair ties. Josh (not his real name), a junior there, says about half a dozen games go on during free periods. He tends to play Texas Hold\u2019em with a group of friends he made this year. Their antics draw spectators and even side wagers: \u201cWe have one player who is probably the least skilled, but a lot of people bet on him because he has absurd luck,\u201d he says. \u201cHe pulled our group\u2019s first-of-the-year full house with pocket aces. He\u2019s very entertaining.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other students have discovered vintage technology like Game Boys and mp3 players. Alexei Kotov is a sophomore at Aviation High School in Queens. He bought a CD Walkman on Amazon last year, and since the phone ban started, he has been packing his dad\u2019s old CDs \u2014 the Doors, Weezer \u2014 in his backpack. \u201cMy favorite one\u2019s probably No Doubt\u2019s Tragic Kingdom,\u201d Alexei says. \u201cI like the vocals. It\u2019s, like, really emotional.\u201d He shares his earbuds at lunch and swaps recommendations with friends. \u201cOne of them is really into Queen,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Noshin Sayira is a junior at Stuyvesant High School, meaning she\u2019s in the middle of the highest-pressure year at what may be one of the highest-pressure high schools in the country. She tells me that students\u2019 top objection to the phone policy is that it\u2019s become cumbersome to do homework between classes or to quickly study in the hallway before a test. But Noshin recently started printing out her study guides and has found that reviewing on paper actually works better: \u201cI don\u2019t get distracted by notifications,\u201d she says. She and her friends have developed a stress-relieving free-period ritual: They sketch one another\u2019s outfits. \u201cOne of my friends usually has supplies like colored pencils and proper paper,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Tokyo Levy, a seventh-grader at I.S. 318 in Williamsburg, is a discernibly different kid than he was in his phone-carrying days, at least according to his mother, Krystyna Printup, an art teacher at the Brooklyn School for Social Justice in Bushwick. \u201cHe was forced into the rapid learning and usage of technology during COVID when he had to attend school from home via Zoom,\u201d she says. That led to a fixation on video and computer games \u2014 Minecraft, Clash Royale \u2014 then social media. \u201cNow, his phone is no longer clutched by his side to run to after dinner or before bed. There have even been a couple days where he\u2019s left his phone accidentally at home.\u201d At school, after noticing kids gathered around chess boards during lunch, he decided to sign up for the chess club. \u201cI\u2019ve always thought of people who played chess as really intelligent people. I see other people play, and it has really motivated me to try it out for myself,\u201d he says. Participating in soccer in the schoolyard at recess inspired him to join a soccer league in his neighborhood, too.<\/p>\n

Lately, he\u2019s been bugging his parents not for a new video game or an upgraded phone but for a mainstay of their own childhoods: a bicycle. He wants to hang out with the new friends he\u2019s made at school on the weekends.<\/p>\n

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