Phones in class: classroom tool or total chaos? Join the conversation with Phones in Focus.
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May 3, 2025
Should students be allowed to use cellphones in schools? Teachers are speaking up on school phone policies. Take a brief survey and read insights from Angela Duckworth on how data can drive smarter decisions.
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Cellphone policies in schools have become one of the most pressing—and polarizing—topics in education today. While opinions are everywhere, what’s often missing from the conversation is the voice of the people who manage this issue every day: teachers. A recent report from the National Center for Education Statistics found that nearly 77 percent of public schools now prohibit non-academic phone use during class—highlighting just how widespread and urgent the conversation has become. That’s what the national Phones in Focus initiative, backed by the AFT and led by University of Pennsylvania psychologist and best-selling author Angela Duckworth, is working to change. By gathering insights directly from educators across the country, the project is building a detailed, real-time picture of how schools handle phone use—and how those policies impact student learning, classroom dynamics, and teacher well-being.
With thousands of educators already participating, the survey is helping inform smarter, evidence-based school phone policies rooted in real classroom experiences. The survey only takes a few minutes, keeps your responses completely confidential, and gives you a real-time look at how your school stacks up nationwide. So many teachers are dealing with constant phone-related disruptions and looking for ways to solve the problem that fit their school's needs. Contribute your voice to help share your experience and be a part of the conversation influencing phone use policies in education.
To better understand the goals behind Phones in Focus, and why educator input is so essential, I recently chatted online with Dr. Angela Duckworth. She shared what inspired the initiative, how the data is being used and what she hopes teachers will take away from it.
Andy Kratochvil: You’ve spent much of your career focused on education, psychology and student success. How has your earlier work shaped your thinking around school environments and technology today?
Angela Duckworth: Since my first day of graduate school, I have been studying how students resolve conflicts between what feels good in the moment and, alternatively, what is good for them in the long run. Temptations have been around forever—easier, more enjoyable distractions are hard to resist, particularly when learning requires effort and, at times, tolerating frustration. What’s new now, I think, is that a typical middle or high school student is carrying around an especially potent temptation in the palm of their hand.
Andy Kratochvil: What motivated you to launch the Phones in Focus initiative, and why is it so timely for educators today?
Angela Duckworth: The perspective—and the observations—of educators need to inform the debate about school cellphone policies. The data we’ve collected so far, from over 13,000 teachers in all 50 states, are beginning to paint a picture of what school cellphone policies are at present, with a level of detail that is unprecedented. One pattern that is striking—even at this early stage in what we intend to be a two-year project—is that most educators wish their school had more restrictive policies than they do now. In the open-ended comments, which are optional, we are hearing from many, many teachers who find it exhausting to “police” phone use in their classrooms.
Andy Kratochvil: Why are you personally passionate about helping schools develop evidence-based cellphone policies?
Angela Duckworth: I’m a former teacher myself, having taught in the public schools of New York City, San Francisco and Philadelphia. And I’m a mom of two Gen Z daughters—both of whom are in their early 20s and tell me that when they start families, they will not let their children use their phones as much as I did! I know there is a lot of nuance to the debate about teens and phones, but when it comes to schools, I hope we can all agree that we need evidence-based policies that optimize learning and well-being for students, and at the same time make teaching a sustainable, fulfilling profession.
Andy Kratochvil: How do you envision the Phones in Focus survey data empowering teachers and school leaders to shape effective school environments?
Angela Duckworth: My hope is that we can get at least a few educators from every public school in the U.S. to complete the 100 percent confidential survey at www.phonesinfocus.org. It’s very short—only a few minutes—and it unlocks a powerful analysis. Basically, we’ll look at policies and their implementation and link them to student outcomes. That will enable us to provide a report to superintendents at both the state and district level—so they can make decisions based on data.
Andy Kratochvil: Phones in Focus emphasizes that not all phone policies should be one-size-fits-all. How can the data collected help schools find policies that fit their unique communities?
Angela Duckworth: In addition to looking at which policies are working best for different types of schools (e.g., charter vs. district, rural vs. urban vs. suburban, middle vs. high, small vs. large), we’re going to identify “positive outliers”—schools where basically everyone is saying things are going great. And we’re going to do focused case studies of those positive outliers—visiting them in person and, if our budget allows, talking to teachers, students and parents. We want to identify the specific strategies that underlie the most successful school cellphone policies for different communities—creating something of a playbook for other schools.
Andy Kratochvil: How do you think cellphone policies can be shaped to be equitable, especially for students who may rely on their phones for family communication or other essential needs?
Angela Duckworth: Many parents worry that without a phone, their child will not be able to communicate with them when they need to. We’re hoping to identify specific school strategies for addressing that issue.
Andy Kratochvil: How can school communities—including parents and students—be part of building more supportive phone policies based on the survey findings?
Angela Duckworth: As a scientist who studies self-regulation, I can tell you that expecting students to use willpower to resist their phones is naive. That doesn’t work for young people—and it doesn’t work for adults, either. So I hope we can all resist the urge to blame, and instead direct our collective energy toward finding a solution that literally all stakeholders, including students and parents, feel good about.
Andy Kratochvil: If you could send one message to every teacher about participating in the Phones in Focus survey, what would it be?
Angela Duckworth: For every teacher who has taken the time to visit www.phonesinfocus.org, thank you. You’re doing what teachers do, which is invest energy toward the common good. For any teacher who hasn’t yet taken the survey, I urge you to check it out. The survey is, if I may, UX-awesome. It’s fast, straightforward, and at the end, you get an instant real-time snapshot of how educators nationwide have answered the same questions. So you can compare your school and your experience to national data. Also, there’s a fun raffle to thank you for your time.
Phones in Focus is about more than policies—it’s about listening to teachers and learning from what’s really happening in classrooms.
As Duckworth shared, the goal isn’t to push one answer for every school, but to understand what’s working, where and why—so we can all make more informed decisions that support student learning and make teaching more sustainable.
If you haven’t taken the survey yet, now’s the time; it closes in mid-June. It’s brief (just a few minutes), completely confidential and gives you an instant snapshot of how your experience compares with educators across the country. Plus, there’s a fun raffle to thank you for your time: Each week, one educator wins a $100 prize along with a $100 donation to their school. And there's a grand prize up for grabs—a $500 VISA gift card, a $500 school donation, signed copies of Grit by Angela Duckworth and Mindset by Carol Dweck, and a personalized professional development session with Duckworth. Head to phonesinfocus.org to take the survey and be part of the conversation. Your voice matters—and it’s helping shape the future of cell phone policies in schools.
