With student test scores in a decade long decline, many researchers are pointing to cell phones and social media as the catalyst. Can cell phone bans turn student learning around?
AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
For over a decade, student test scores in the U.S. have been on the decline, and education researchers are in a desperate scramble to figure out why. One possible answer – the rise of smartphones and the amount of time kids spend staring at them. NPR’s Sequoia Carrillo has more.
SEQUOIA CARRILLO, BYLINE: Martin West is a professor at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education, and he looks at a lot of data. He likes to keep an eye on how things are going for America’s students. And a few years ago, he started to notice something. Test scores were falling off.
MARTIN WEST: Actually, if you look at the data over the long term, it’s very clear that the declines started prior to the pandemic.
CARRILLO: There are several policy factors in the U.S. to consider, like a major change away from test-based accountability. But in looking at other countries, West saw a similar pattern of decline, even in places with wildly different testing strategies.
WEST: What is an explanation that can check all of those boxes?
CARRILLO: One possibility West and others are exploring revolves around a cultural factor.
DAVID FIGLIO: I’m 55 years old, and when my phone buzzes in my pocket, I have to resist the temptation to look at that text, right? Now imagine you’re a 14-year-old.
CARRILLO: David Figlio, a professor of economics at the University of Rochester, says this may be one of the culprits.
FIGLIO: If we have these extremely addictive devices on our person 24 hours a day or near us 24 hours a day, it stands to reason that this has to be one of the contributing factors.
CARRILLO: Banning cell phones in schools has become a popular and bipartisan approach. At least 32 states now have some kind of restriction. Figlio and other researchers are scrambling to keep up. He’s gathered data from a Florida district over the last two years. He says it’s still too early to draw conclusions, but similar projects are underway around the country.
KATHY DO: It’s important for us to slow down, look at what the research is really saying about the impacts of cell phones on learning and well-being.
CARRILLO: That’s Kathy Do, a researcher at UCLA’s School of Education. She recently released one of the first national surveys on the impact of cell phone bans.
DO: Oftentimes, these policy decisions are ahead of the science on this issue, especially looking at the – you know, the impact of cell phone bans in schools, like the actual policies themselves.
CARRILLO: Her survey focused on the need for building healthy digital habits and how cell phones are a distraction when not used intentionally for instruction. But in some classrooms, phones can be a learning tool.
DO: It’s more nuanced. It’s not all bad.
CARRILLO: She says schools shouldn’t be afraid to reimagine or change their policies as more research comes out. All three researchers agree there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to cell phones. And as much as legislators may want this to be a quick fix, the researchers say it’s still too early to tell.
Sequoia Carrillo, NPR News.
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Sequoia Carrillo 2025-12-14 14:05:23
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