Why are school rules important? They help us keep the school community safe and allow the school to be represented gracefully in the public eye. School rules are meant to protect, but sometimes they get overprotective, and the rules end up being useless or ridiculous. An example of that from my school is the rule ‘parents must apply for permission for their daughters to bring their mobiles phones to school and promise to keep the phones switched off when the girls are in school. Student caught using their phones in school will have their devices confiscated for one week, until they are directly returned to the parents in person.’
I think that it is ridiculous that parents must apply for permission, since most students put it into their backpacks nevertheless. I understand that some parents may not pay enough attention and the student could easily sneak their phone to school, but I think that students aged 13-18 should already be allowed to make these decisions on their own. It would be much simpler if students could just bring their phones to school and store it away during lesson times, instead of parents having to apply for permission. In Hong Kong, many students travel to school alone, mostly by train or bus. Parents sometimes need to check in with their children and communicate with them to ensure their safety, and it is absurd that they need to apply for permission to do that. Also, it would be much easier to locate or contact the parents in an emergency. Rather than the school office having to look up the parent’s information on the school system, the student can simply just press their parent’s contact number. It would be especially useful in weather emergencies, when the entire school needs to leave abruptly at a much earlier time.
Furthermore, I think that students shouldn’t have to completely switch off their phones during school time. As mentioned above, many students commute to school alone, and some parents install tracking apps into their devices to give themselves a peace of mind by knowing where their child is. These applications may not work with their phone completely turned off, which cancels out the purpose of it. Sometimes, there are also unforeseeable family emergencies that the student needs to be informed of immediately, and it would be much easier to reach them directly instead of through the school office. However, I do agree that the continuous buzzing from unnecessary messages may be a distraction to the class, so maybe students could instead turn their devices to silent mode or only allow calls from important contacts.
Lastly, I think that the punishment for use of mobile phones during school time is unhelpful and will cause much trouble for multiple parties. Phones are a crucial part of anyone’s life today and confiscating it for a week would cause problems for the student. After school, their parents wouldn’t be able to check on them as usual, and if by any chance they got lost, they wouldn’t have Google Maps to help them, or a tracking app so their parents could locate them. In addition to that, parents would have to set up a meeting with their form teachers to retrieve the phone, which is a waste of time for both parties, especially if the parents work full time or have demanding jobs. However, students could still use their phones for internet surfing or using social media during school time. Therefore, eliminating a punishment completely would just allow them to get off easily. An alternative to the punishment stated in the school rule is to make the student write an essay on a certain current affair, or to deprive them of a privilege, like leaving the classroom during lunchtime.
To summarize, I think this school rule is nonsensical and it could trouble many parties for illogical reasons. There are ways to enforce phone usage conduct while avoiding unnecessary hassle. I think this school rule can be altered or deleted, so that while the community is still protected, it would be in a more sensible way.
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