Let's take credit where credit isn't due

[minx]

Youngkin has ordered the state board of education to come up with a cell phone use policy.

After most of Nova has already come up with theirs, including Stafford and Fredericksburg.

But you know he'll take credit for developing the policy after talking with all of them.

On a side note, about damn time that these counties grew a set and told parents that their beloveds don't need a cell phone on them during the school day.
Stafford did try when the eldest spawn entered her freshman year.  You could carry a cell, but had to be turned off and in a location where it could not be seen, like inside of a backpack.
Otherwise, teacher could nap it and send it to cell jail in the main office where the only release was a parent or guardian coming to visit.  Kids didn't mind it - daughter told me that the biggest complaint was from kids who wanted to put the phone in a mesh side pocket, but most teachers let that go by.  Of course parents totally freaked at not being able to check in and ask how their baby's day was going so the policy was reversed.

Now Stafford has said no phones in classes - if the class requires technology, the school will provide it to the student.  About damn time.

[Dave's Not Here Man]

Bridges to nowhere.

Glad the school systems are doing this. It's long overdue. It's a compromise in my opinion and if compromise doesn't work then the next step is to ban them altogether.

I don't remember all the details but I got a call from the office and had to go retrieve my daughter and her phone from school one day. It was middle school and she was in 8th grade. The only reason we allowed her to take it to school was because she participated in multiple sports and if a practice was canceled or whatever, she could let us know when to pick her up. So I guess they were allowed to have phones but were supposed to stay in their lockers. She also wasn't allowed to have any social media and one night we took her to her freshmen orientation at the high school and one of her friends blurted out "I saw your post on Facebook" (it might've been myspace, I'm not sure) and she turned white as a ghost. The final straw was some time later when I got the phone bill and it was like $300. That's when you paid for every text and she had 10,000+ of them in one month. We made some changes to our policy since compromise up to that point had obviously failed.

[minx]

I remember when we got text. Had to explain to the eldest that 'K' was a text. Just the same as writing the word 'okay' and hitting send. She was under some weird delusion that just sending textspeak didn't count. $75 later she realized it did.

We got the youngest a phone when she got into HS - she was in marching band and needed to call me when the afterschool bus dropped her off, since it didn't go into our neighborhood, but the local elementary school. Standard flip phone that did nothing but call. And really if your kid 'needs' a cell for emergencies, that's what it should be. Something that can make a call and that's it.

I would make an exception for kids with medical conditions that wear monitors that are controlled by an app though - lots of diabetics wear CGM that are monitored through an app that alerts them if their blood sugar goes way off. But that's really a small minority of people. (BTW, that app is super cool. Spouse has a friend who's kid has Downs and diabetes. She has a monitor that alerts mom if there are issues. Helps the kid (now an adult) live independently, but also gets her help right away).

[Dave's Not Here Man]

Jul 10, 2024 12:39:36 GMT -5 minx said:

I remember when we got text. Had to explain to the eldest that 'K' was a text. Just the same as writing the word 'okay' and hitting send. She was under some weird delusion that just sending textspeak didn't count. $75 later she realized it did.

We got the youngest a phone when she got into HS - she was in marching band and needed to call me when the afterschool bus dropped her off, since it didn't go into our neighborhood, but the local elementary school. Standard flip phone that did nothing but call. And really if your kid 'needs' a cell for emergencies, that's what it should be. Something that can make a call and that's it.

I would make an exception for kids with medical conditions that wear monitors that are controlled by an app though - lots of diabetics wear CGM that are monitored through an app that alerts them if their blood sugar goes way off. But that's really a small minority of people. (BTW, that app is super cool. Spouse has a friend who's kid has Downs and diabetes. She has a monitor that alerts mom if there are issues. Helps the kid (now an adult) live independently, but also gets her help right away).

Texting came before cell phones. Think about that and get back to me........... I know I sent a lot of ROTFLMAO! I don't know why that struck me as funny, maybe because sending via telegram cost by the character at one time........ so you paid the old timey guy at Western Union to reply- tx


LOL I'm dead.

[Dave's Not Here Man]

There are always going to exceptions. Hopefully based on actual needs other than neurotic "need to know" syndrome (if you or someone you love suffers from NNTK, ask your doctor about ______). Name a drug y'all, make it catchy for the jingle!

[minx]

Truth.

And from what a lot of people have told me, the worst school day text offenders ARE parents who want to just see how little Johnny and Susie's day is going.

As we've noted before, this shit starts with the parents - too many of them have developed a culture of entitlement where they and their kids rule and we all bow to them.

Was on the book of faces yesterday and there was an article about parents who purchase books (most often "Oh the Places You'll Go" by Dr. Seuss) when their kids start school and have their teachers sign it every year until the kid graduates. Yes, a heartwarming gift. In the comments, a teacher said that she wished this trend would completely stop. The end of the school year was stressful enough without facing a line of parents all holding the same book and bopping back and forth waiting for their turn to think of something heartwarming to say about their kid that's totally unique.

Next comment was from a parent who said this woman was mean-spirited and should get out of teaching.
I commented that this put a tremendous stress on the kid's teacher - what if your kid wasn't the little darling you imagined and instead make that teaching year hell? Maybe the teachers should just switch to saying a generic 'Good Luck Next Year!' message for all of them. You want meaningful, why not write something in the book each year about something your kid did that was meaningful and stood out to YOU.
Well, of course that didn't fly. She was special, and she would make the teacher sign each year.

So yeah, I guess we're going to reach a point where something that was sweet gets corrupted and a policy has to be passed to prevent the selfish from taking advantage.

I do wonder how parents do the book thing when their kids get to the higher grades. I didn't know any of my kids MS teachers, and only a few of their HS teachers. And I assume that it was the same for most of the teachers. Some knew my kids better than others.

Favorite 'school memory' thing was something I saw back when my kids were little. Mom made a scrapbook for each kid. Started with a picture of mom and dad while mom was pregnant and a small story about how excited they were to be having a baby. Then a picture of the baby with another short story. After that, they did two pages a year - one was a small collage of about 6 pictures, and the second was a page listing cool memories about the years, or things they said. She saved it until they got their 'real' first FT job. Kids went bat shit crazy over it. Showed their growth, but also showed the love their parents had for them. They had 5 kids, and she said the two hardest parts were choosing what pictures and funny stories to use at the end of the year and hiding the books so the kids didn't see them too early.

[minx]

And I can't say how much I love the blood sugar monitor. One of Jack's pickleball friends has pretty much gotten her life back because of it. Her daughter is cognitively disabled but has a job as a school aide - it's flexible so she doesn't have to be there every day if she's not well. But she's also diabetic and terrible at keeping track of her blood sugar. Monitor alerts mom so she can call school - they tell kiddo to go to the nurses' office and wait for mom. Mom can leave what she's doing and go down there.

But even better than that, kiddo is now learning more about what to do when the monitor beeps, and is taking initiative to ask for a break to eat something or lie down. So mom is having to leave activities less and less. A win for both of them - kiddo feels much more confident and mature, and mom is happy both for that and for being able to leave the house and do stuff again.

[Dave's Not Here Man]

Anything medically necessary is or should be automatically exempt. Waiting to see if Spotsy's School Board jumps on the bandwagon. We have a new Superintendent. Dude came from Colonial Beach. Two Schools in CB by the way. LOL. Add that to Lisa Phelps and her never ending bullshit.

[minx]

HAHAHAHA! Lisa Phelps will never stop her shit. Never. And it's destroying the school system, which I'm sure is her goal.