by Parker Vibbert and Kaylee Borelli

July 30, 2026 ushered in a new school year at JHS. Along with hundreds of new students, there is a new policy here and in all Indiana high schools: no cell phones.

The Indiana State Senate passed Senate Bill 78 in February, instituting a statewide bell-to-bell cell phone ban in every public and charter school in the state.

Before SB 78, the Indiana Legislature passed Senate Enrolled Act 185 in 2024, which banned cell phone use during instructional time during the 2025-26 School year, but set clear exceptions for education, emergency, health care needs, and disability-related accommodations. However, it did not address how schools were to enforce the bans, nor did it address lunchtime or passing periods.

Under SB 78, cell phones are banned bell-to-bell, with minimal exceptions for health reasons. At JHS, teachers and staff confiscate student phones and turn them into the front office in yellow envelopes; students and eventually parents must pick confiscated phones up at the end of the school day or after school.

German Teacher Lisa Stumler said the ban is necessary and beneficial.

“I’ve noticed people looking each other in the eye more now, and in the hallway, they’re paying attention to where they’re going, and they’re not all looking down,” Stumler said.

“It’s easier in class to not be paranoid, ‘Are they just on TikTok?’ I don’t have to think about that at all,” she added.

Previously, the policy regarding phones at JHS was largely at each teacher’s discretion, with most simply forbidding phones during instruction, but allowing them after. 

Stumler allowed students to use their phones during non-instructional time, or as a substitute for a Chromebook. Unfortunately, Stumler said they would often become distracted.

“They’d just want to scroll.”

English teacher Justin Linde is “not during instruction” policy worked for a short time, he said, but it ultimately fizzled when students stopped putting their phones in calculator pouches.

“After a couple of weeks, it became ‘I don’t have a phone,’ and I couldn’t accuse someone of not having a phone. It got to the point where everybody was on their phones. Regardless of it being an honors class or a regular class or AP,” Linde said.

The new legislation has significantly impacted media classes, designed to train future journalists to properly use technology.

Radio and broadcasting teacher Fred Cowgill said the statewide ban has heavily affected WJHI’s operations.

“The entire business of broadcast and communications and information, every major news organization is using smartphones. Our entire workflow from the moment we took over two years ago was using our students’ personal cellphones,” Cowgill said.

Cowgill said WJHI was unprepared for the outright ban.

“When we got wind of it this summer that the state was going to implement this bell-to-bell ban of phones in schools, we were told we’d get a ‘hall pass’ to still use them, but around July 1, we were told ‘No’.”

Cowgill’s words were echoed by principal Pam Hall, who said she was unaware the ban would be outright.

“When they were still talking about putting it into law, they talked about giving schools the autonomy to come up with their own plan on how to do it, whether that would be to allow phones in curricular classes. When the law was enacted, they took that away,” Hall explained.

Cowgill, Hall, Linde, Stumler, and freshman counselor Andrea Schedler all agreed the ban was necessary, but differed on the scope of exceptions.

Stumler, Schedler, and Linde said students should be allowed to have phones during lunch.

“If they can handle it, I think lunch should be a time when they can have it. It gives you downtime,” Schedler said.

Linde agreed. “I think the bill went from one extreme to the other. I don’t understand how you could regulate them in the hallway, or at lunch, and I think students should have access to their phones at those parts of the day.”

Cowgill said student journalism should have been exempt from the ban for curricular reasons.

“The State of Indiana barring smartphone use from its high school communication classes sends the wrong message. We were using them as tools, not as an entertainment device. What better way to teach the correct use of personal smartphones than by giving us the opportunity to do that?”

Hall added that the ban puts an unnecessary burden on emergencies and worried parents.

“I’m one of those parents; my advice to kids is to put it in your purse or in your pocket, turned off or silent at all times, in case something happens, and you have to get out. But don’t have it out. I think it’s important that students, in case of an emergency, have a way to communicate.”