Methodology

This tracker aims to be the most accurate and current public resource on school phone and screen time policy in the United States. Here's how the data is collected, categorized, and updated.

Data Sources

State laws

Sourced directly from state legislature websites, governor signing announcements, and LegiScan. Every state entry links to the primary bill text or official state DOE page. We do not rely on press releases or secondary sources for the legislative record.

District actions

Sourced from local school board minutes, district press releases, and verified local news coverage. Districts are included when a formal board vote or written policy is on record — informal statements or verbal commitments are not included.

Community advocacy

Parent groups and grassroots campaigns are included when they have demonstrated a formal, organized presence — a public meeting, a filed petition, or documented media coverage. The advocacy category is not a judgment of the group's position, only a record of their existence and activity.

Policy Categories

• Bell-to-bell ban — state law prohibits personal phone use from first bell to last bell, covering all K–12 students.
• Class restriction — phones must be stored during instructional time but may be used during passing periods or lunch.
• District policies — no statewide law, but significant district-level action is documented here.
• Guidance only — the state has issued non-binding guidance encouraging districts to restrict phones, but no law has passed.
• Social media limits — law targets social media access specifically, rather than phones broadly.
• Pending — legislation has been introduced and is actively moving through the legislature but has not yet been enacted.
• No law — no statewide policy exists; individual districts set their own rules.

News Categorization

Every article is automatically tagged based on keywords in its headline and summary:

• 📱 Phone Ban — article primarily covers personal phone bans, phone-free policies, Yondr pouches, or phone storage requirements.
• 💻 Screen Time — article primarily covers school-issued device limits, Chromebook policies, classroom screen time caps, or ed-tech restrictions.
• 📰 Other — article was pulled by the news scraper but is not directly about phone or screen time policy. These appear in the All News feed but not on the homepage Top 10.

Regional Color Coding

State tags in the news ticker and news feed are color-coded by US Census region:

News

Articles are collected and updated daily from sources across all 50 states. State policy data is reviewed and updated manually as new laws are enacted or significant district actions are reported.

Corrections

If you spot an error — a misclassified law, a missing district action, an outdated status, or an article that shouldn't be tagged the way it is — please reach out via Substack. We take accuracy seriously and will correct errors promptly.