The absence of mobile phones and smartwatches in the hallways of Kalispell Middle School will become a regular sight beginning in March as the school pilots a change to its electronic device policy.

The middle school has taken a step back to reflect on the wellbeing of students and research the potential connections of smartphone use in schools with and anxiety, attention span and information retention.

“A cellphone electronic device policy probably goes back 20 years when we had CD players and then the iPod,” Kalispell Middle School Principal Tryg Johnson said. “It was just music. Now, electronic devices have exploded to where you’re basically carrying a computer around.”

The policy change being piloted will mean all students’ personal electronic devices — cellphones/smartphones, smartwatches, tablets and wireless headphones — must remain off and in lockers for the duration of the school day from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.

As before, students are encouraged to leave devices at home as the school is not responsible for lost, stolen or confiscated devices. Families are reminded they can communicate with their children through the main office.

Consequences remain the same as before and go into effect if devices are used during the school day or in an unacceptable way such as violating or compromising someone’s privacy by taking photos or video, for example.

Consequences include confiscation of the device. Devices may be searched and parents informed, and in some cases devices could be turned over to law enforcement.

One of the reasons for the pilot program were conflicts that would arise.

Previously, students were allowed to use smartphones and cellphones during passing times between classes, at lunch and in a classroom at a teacher’s discretion.

“Individual teams could set their own process and procedures with what they expected in the classroom, but between classes and lunch was still just wide open,” said Kalispell Middle School Assistant Principal Jeff Hornby, who believes the intent there was to set boundaries for students, but it still resulted in conflicts. To date, since the start of this school year, he said mobile phones have been confiscated by the office more than 72 times. That does not include the number of times individual teachers may have confiscated phones during a class period. Data going back to previous years to determine if that is an increase or decrease wasn’t available, according to Hornby, who said the middle school doesn’t currently retain that information year to year.

What inspired educators to push the pause button on smartphones in schools was hearing youth advocate and social media activist Collin Kartchner speak last October about the mental-health dangers of social media and screen addiction. During school assemblies and parent nights, Kartchner challenged people to rethink their relationships with smartphones.

“The one thing I took away from Collin Kartchner was the people who are designing these apps for these phones don’t actually let their kids have access to them — that’s shocking to me,” said Kalispell Middle School Resource Officer Justin Turner, who has assisted in reviewing the policy.

Hornby and Turner presented school board trustees with a list of online research they have looked at in seeing what studies were out there on the use — even just the presence of — smartphones and children and young adults.

“Being in law enforcement and working some of the cases that I do, seeing kids being victimized through the uses of cellphones, it’s really, it’s honestly kind of disgusting some of the current cases I have going on right now,” Turner said. “They would completely be mitigated if we didn’t have cellphones in schools.”

In its research, the school also surveyed students, staff and families on mobile device use and proposed policy changes.

The top five ways students who responded to a question about how they used their phones at school broke down to: 137 using phones to contact parents; 56 using phones to feel safe at school; 46 using it to listen to music; 42 using phones to play games and 32 to text friends. Using social media, reading, videos/photos, research, calculation were all under 18 students.

Hornby said 601 students responded to a survey. Current enrollment is 1,069 students.

The top three choices of students who participated in the survey were: 28.4%, go back to the rule of phones being off and in lockers; 23.9%, off and kept in lockers except during lunch; 20.9%, policy remain worded as currently is. The fourth highest choice was 17.9% of students who selected having a phone-free campus.

Hornby said 209 parents responded to a survey. About 64.6% of people who responded said they would support the proposed policy of allowing electronic devices on campus, but have them kept in a backpack or locker from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Approximately 18.8% of respondents supported a device-free campus, while 16.7% supported devices on campus, but only used at lunch.

Parents were also asked what age their child had their first mobile phone. About 27.4% said their child does not have a smartphone; 26.7% said their child got his or her first cellphone at age 11; 23.3% at age 12; 11.6% at age 13; 7.5% before age 10 and the remainder at age 14.

“One thing that is really not able to be quantified by data is the social interaction that kids are experiencing,” Turner said, noting that anecdotally, after talking to teachers, “kids now talking to each other, being kind of goofy and fun — being 10- and 12-year-old kids because they’re not worried about someone taking a photo of them, [or] bullying them, so just being allowed to be kids.”

The middle school sought school board approval since the change would deviate from school district policy and was unanimously approved Feb. 11.

The middle school was asked to evaluate and present on the pilot at a June school board meeting.

“We may not have all the data we want, but we would probably have enough,” Kalispell Public Schools Superintendent Mark Flatau said.

Other schools in the valley have varying policies.

Columbia Falls High School currently has a policy similar to what Kalispell is trying. Columbia Falls Junior High discourages cellphones and electronic devices being used, but if a student chooses to bring one to school it must be kept in lockers for the duration of the school day.

Somers Middle School also encourages a phone-free campus in its policy, citing phone dependency leading to stress; however, it allows students to use cellphones before and after school in addition to giving classroom teachers the option to implement a “bring your own device” policy on a supervised and limited basis.

In Bigfork, the middle school allows personal computers, portable radios, video systems and cellphones during the school day for educational purposes at the discretion of teachers.

“That being said, students do use their phones during breaks, and at lunch with the knowledge that they may be asked to put them away. Since our policy is written the way it is, it gives each teacher/employee the ability to monitor and take cellphones if they are not being used for educational purposes,” said Bigfork Middle School Assistant Principal Charlie Appleby.

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.