The Department of Education will order all schools in Catalonia, from kindergarten to high school, and including vocational training institutes (FP), to formally regulate the use of mobile phones in their schools. They will have to include in their center rules when and where students can use mobile phones. Or if they won't even be able to take him to school.
This self-regulation will come after Education publishes some "clear guidelines", a reference framework document, which it will transfer to schools in January. "In the event that there were decisions outside of the department's criteria, the inspection will act", indicated yesterday Ignasi Garcia Plata, Secretary of Educational Transformation.
From then on, each school, through the school council, will discuss how it is organised. After the outcome of this debate, the use of mobile phones will be specified in a document and will be incorporated into the school's operating rules.
The ministry has not yet decided whether it will force immediate application or postpone it for the 2024-2025 school year. At the moment, only 52% of schools and institutes have it formally regulated and the goal is for it to be 100%.
The Secretary of Educational Transformation explained that the purpose is not to impose an "imperative mandate", but to promote internal debate in schools. In the school communities, he emphasized, the students are present, who can reflect on the use they give to the mobile phone, and the parents, key in the digital education of their children.
The secretary stated that a standard does not work for everyone, since a citizen environment is not the same as a rural one, a school is not the same as an institute or a vocational training center, with students up to 18 years old.
Therefore, the guidelines will foresee aspects such as use in class, when the teacher deems it appropriate, in spaces of the building such as corridors, libraries or in the courtyards. They will also provide guidance on extracurricular time. Likewise, indications will be given by age groups. "There are children aged 9 or 10 who already have mobile phones and their presence affects the whole community, which is why the educational factor is important", pointed out Garcia Plata.
To draw up the guidelines document, the ministry will collect the participative process that is being promoted by the Catalan School Council, which will deliver a recommendation document to the administration in December. Currently, the 12 territorial services are working to specify the key elements in the debate, as the councilor Anna Simó announced at the beginning of the school year.
Yesterday the Barcelona School Council spoke, whose president, Lluís Rabell, indicated that there was a general consensus on the need to regulate them. Teachers are asking Education for a clear regulatory framework, not "improvised", suitable for each age and that the regulation does not depend on the centers but on the ministry. In addition, if the use of mobile phones is abolished, there must be computers.
Barcelona's family associations, for their part, agree 100% that Education should regulate mobile phones at school. They want this decision not to be transferred to the centers or to the families. In addition, they hope that extracurricular activities will be extended to the most vulnerable students so that they do not use their mobile phones when school is over.
The mobile phone debate coincides with the initiative of a group of parents who propose to ban mobile phones before the age of 16, to which thousands of families have joined. Garcia Plata welcomed debates of this type, which expand awareness about the use of mobile phones and the responsibility of parents when they are handed over to them. He also emphasized that digital education must be shared between schools and families. However, "banning it in schools does not make the pedagogical sense we want to promote", he reiterated.
The department's survey was conducted on 53% of educational centers that have formally regulated the use of mobile phones. 3% of centers allow free use, while 26% do not even allow it to be taken to the center. A large majority (67%) use it at specific times at the teacher's discretion.
