Apr 23, 2024
Last week, I had the privilege of speaking with a school leader who implemented a district-wide, phone-free school policy: Mr. Jim Foudy, the Blaine County School District Superintendent in Hailey, Idaho.
Today, I want to share his story with you. (Mr. Foudy has given me permission to write about him and his district.)
Like many school leaders nationwide in recent years, Mr. Foudy was hearing increasingly from his teachers about the challenges presented by student smartphones, watches, and earbuds in the classroom.
Different schools in his district had different policies about student devices, resulting in confusion, enforcement challenges, and continued student behavior problems.
When asked to remove their headphones, students would take out one and turn their heads to appear as if they were paying attention.
Social media dramas were playing out in class and causing behavior problems.
Phone and device confiscation was limited, and often didn't happen. It was impossible to enforce.
Mr. Foudy realized that change was needed, so he gathered information first. Partnering with St. Luke’s and Boise State University, Blaine County administered wellness surveys last October to get a pulse on their students.
Two key patterns emerged and grabbed Mr. Foudy’s attention:
More than half of the students in Blaine County were getting less than 7 hours of sleep a night.
50% of ninth-grade girls showed signs of clinical depression.
These were shocking numbers. So few kids getting the recommended amount of sleep meant a higher risk of poor health, focus, grades, social skills, and so much more.
And half of ninth-grade girls were facing clinical depression?
Addressing the sleep issues took a community effort: the District Wellness Committee decided that teachers with assignment deadlines on specific dates should change the time of the deadlines from midnight to 9 PM, then school representatives from the Wellness Community took this proposal to their schools and asked the teachers to agree to this.
Additionally, Mr. Foudy helped launch a sleep campaign, offering public forums and informing parents about the importance of sleep to youth mental health.
Regarding smartphones and social media, Mr. Foudy recognized that it was time to heed the teacher’s concerns and strengthen the district’s current policy on student devices.
In an update to their policy, Blaine County made it very clear that:
Student devices must be off, out of sight, and not on their person from first bell to last bell.
If a device is visible, stored on their person, or turned on during the day, it will be confiscated – and a parent has to pick it up.
Parents should not expect to communicate with their children during the school day via personal devices; the front office will relay important messages as needed.
When changing policies about phone use, it’s easy to get bogged down in the hypotheticals and what-ifs. But we can’t let perfection be the enemy of good. Blaine County’s phone-free school policy is clear, concise, and grounded in research. It’s now a district-wide policy, so individual schools and teachers no longer dictate their own policies. Teachers could get back to building relationships with students, students could focus on schoolwork and friendships, and administrators could go back to the “regular” challenges of running a school.
It wasn’t an overnight decision or change, and that’s an important detail here.
Blaine County did a lot of work to educate parents and the community about the upcoming change. They spent the summer before “over-communicating” with families about what the change would entail and why it mattered, and they made it clear that parents would be responsible for picking up confiscated devices.
Within a few weeks, drastic changes were noticeable:
Suspension rates dropped 50%.
Confiscation of student devices went down to almost zero — less than 1% of the total student body per day.
And most powerfully, about six weeks into the change students approached teachers and district administrators to express their gratitude.
I know many parents and administrators out there want change, but many are afraid to implement it or push for it (at home and school). We forget that while our children and students might not like screentime limits or a phone-free school, they may actually want them.
In the Epilogue of my book, I wrote about what it means to be a “first fish.” After a conversation with Dr. Jared Cooney Horvath about the challenges of trying to change the way technology is being implemented in education, he offered me this metaphor:
“Take a school of fish. When one fish swims away from the school, no other fish will follow. When two fish swim away, the school still won’t follow. But after three or four fish, the school will shift direction.”
Mr. Foudy, the district policy committee and the Board of Trustees made Blaine County a “first fish” district, not just because of the changes they made but because of the intentionality that went into their decision-making. Additionally, Mr. Foudy’s ability to listen to his teachers, see the bigger picture, make informed and intentional decisions about next steps, and commit to that change signifies his leadership prowess.
When I asked Mr. Foudy if I could share his story, he wrote:
“We never imagined impacting anyone outside of our rural district. If we can help someone else to ‘shrink the change’ and move this forward, it would mean the world to my team and this Board of Trustees.”
Margaret Mead wrote, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed individuals can change the world. In fact, it's the only thing that ever has."
Change starts small: with the teachers who expressed concerns, with the administrators who listened, and with the districts that changed the policy to an approach that is best for children and learning. As a result of their efforts and tremendously positive results, two neighboring districts have joined Blaine County in implementing phone-free policies in their districts.
Thank you, Mr. Foudy, and Blaine County, for being the first fish in your community and showing others that it is possible– and indeed even deeply beneficial– to do hard things.
