Parents can’t do this alone

We need policy help on kids and smartphones.

Amid the bleak news about American education, one positive trend has emerged: More and more states and school districts are getting serious about removing smartphones from classrooms and, in some cases, from schools altogether.

Basically every stakeholder I know in American education — including parents, teachers, and administrators at public and charter schools — thinks this is a good idea and that all we really need to do is figure out implementation details and the precise contours of the rules.

And support for this change is broad-based and bipartisan. I believe it was generally red states that acted first on this issue, and a lot of social conservatives were early proponents of school phone bans. But now we have teachers’ union leaders touting anti-phone research and New York implementing policies that are similar to those in Florida schools.

There’s all kinds of craziness and polarization out there, but sensible people from very different perspectives can at least come together around this.

But in the interests of truth-seeking and self-discipline, I do want to put my convictions on this to the test. A lot of what you hear in terms of skepticism of these bans is either parents expressing irrational worries about school shootings or else childless internet personalities seemingly trying to pander to an audience of teenagers.

Most of these takes are easy to dismiss, and I think you probably should dismiss them.

Elizabeth Nolan Brown at Reason, though, has written a long series of pieces expressing skepticism of the anti-smartphone consensus, and I think that skepticism is worth taking seriously. But engaging seriously with these critiques requires thinking a bit about where they’re coming from.

I have mixed feelings about libertarian institutions.