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Tech-savvy students

When living life means living virtually

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By Kristie Aronow

September 24, 2009 | 12:00 a.m. CST

It’s a poetic scene of sorts when students flood the hallways at Rock Bridge and Hickman High Schools. Cell phones are whipped out, and fingers fly across keypads. Students are using technology for myriad reasons, from arranging lunch dates at Angelo’s to checking e-mail. Although it is hard to understand how a majority of socialization can be virtual, today’s students use cell phones, social sites and mp3 players hourly to make and break plans, break and make up and, generally, be teenagers.
But Columbia’s schools have started cracking down on cell-phone use in class because of concerns that students will use the phones to cheat on quizzes or exams. “So many of these kids could click and send an exam to their friends,” says Doug Mirts, assistant principal of Hickman High School. Rock Bridge Principal Kathy Ritter, on the other hand, isn’t worried about that particular kind of cheating because it hasn’t been a significant problem in the past.
However, mp3 players, such as iPods, have found refuge in some classrooms. The basic rule is that students cannot disrupt the flow of the class. “When we’re doing work by ourselves, I just listen to my music,” says Tyler Magruder, a senior at Rock Bridge. “It helps to drown out the noise from other people talking.” Ritter confirms this use is OK as long as students have the teacher’s permission. At Hickman, though, Mirts says iPods and cell phones are fine as long as they aren’t in the classroom.
The Columbia Public School Student Handbook is a little hazy on the issue of electronic devices. According to one entry, cell phones are to be taken from students only in the event of “innappropriate use,” and punishment is up to the school. According to another entry, though, beepers and radios (aka outdated cell phones and iPods) are prohibited and could result in Saturday detention if they are not relinquished.
But the Saturday-morning threat isn’t causing students to leave their iPods and cell phones at home. Socially speaking, these gadgets mean much more than just a phone call or a Facebook status update. For the average high school student, bringing a cell phone or iPod (or both) to school is as important as toting a backpack. And schools aren’t leaving students cell-phone-less at school; safe cell-phone zones have been created. The commons and major hallways are cell-phone-safe areas, but students are banned from using their phones near classrooms.
The Children’s Internet Protection Act encourages schools to adopt screening software, and if implemented, these suggested guidelines for Internet use grant these schools with federal funding.
But strings are attached with these federal funds: Schools have to adopt screening software; the law just doesn’t specify which kind. Rock Bridge and Hickman block social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace with firewalls that ensure students can’t access them from school computers in order to avoid exposure to pictures that are “obscene, child pornography or harmful to minors,” as stated in CIPA.
But there are ways to get around the rules and access blocked sites because so many cell phones now have Internet. And if you check students’ Facebook or MySpace pages, you can find status updates and comments made during school hours.
As technology has advanced, so have the methods for checking in with friends about weekend plans, the football game or the physics final. Passing written notes might be out of style, but that’s only because teenage angst is now spread by satellite or cable uplink.

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