School started for me last week — and our building made a big change to our Bring Your Own Device policy: All phones need to be powered off and put away at all times unless a teacher asks students to use them for a specific activity in class.

We are deliberate about making sure that the “powered off and away” policy is enforced.

Our morning announcements include a reminder each day that every student hears. Then, each teacher is expected to include a reminder at the beginning and end of their class periods.

While the policy was born out of a TON of behavior problems with devices — texting and instant messaging and chatting and cyberbulling was running rampant in all grade levels — I think there’s an even more important reason that “powered off and away” makes sense:

We’ve created a space where our students can live without the extra anxiety that comes along with being a tween/teen living in a digital world.

Our powered off and away policy means our students don’t need to worry about someone grabbing an embarrassing picture or video of them and sharing it out to everyone in their grade level. They don’t need to worry about saying something embarrassing and having word spread before the period ends. They don’t need to worry about wearing something “uncool” and being blown up for it — or being put in the middle of conflict with friends who disagree with one another. And they don’t need to worry about drama that began the night before spilling over into a new school day.

For the eight hours they spend in our building, our students can walk away from a space that they are drawn to, but where social pressure is both hidden and destructive.

That’s GOT to be a really good thing.

I’ll let you know what my kids think after they get a few weeks of device-free living under their belts.

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