How Seniors View the New Tech Policies: A Deep Dive

At the beginning of the school year, a series of changes in technology policy were rolled out in this year’s community handbook, including the Generative AI (GenAI) Policy and the Personal Electronic Device (PED) Policy. There is a continuum for GenAI usage between no use and unrestricted use that rests within teacher discretion on a course-by-course basis. The use of PEDs is restricted to lunch and recess and only for 8th grade and high school, and the student body has been expressing numerous concerns, largely internally, and this article aims to highlight and quantify important details. Below are the results of a poll, several senior interviews, and an interview with a staunch supporter of the new changes: Mr. Comfort, high school chemistry teacher

A survey was conducted among the senior class, which received 105 responses, equivalent to 96.33% of seniors other than myself. Each respondent was asked to rate three items on a scale going in half-point increments from 0 to 10, where 0 is strongly negative, 5 is completely neutral, and 10 is strongly positive. They then briefly explained their choice, which was then categorized central reasons for each and confirmed that no opinions were misrepresented. The three items were the respondent’s experience with the new PED policy specifically in regards to cell phones; their opinions about the wall-mounted phone holders utilized by some teachers; and their assessment of the educational impact of the new technology policies as a whole, including both the PED policy and the generative AI policy.

When looking at the measures of central tendency, both the median and mode were at 5 for each item. The means for the personal experience with phone restrictions and for cumulative academic effect of technology policy were 5.3286 and 5.2048 respectively, both slightly positive but very close to neutral. The only average that leaned in the negative direction was the mean rating of the phone holders, sitting at 4.1714, nearly a whole point below neutral. This is also reflected in the shapes of the data distributions, where the ratings of the phone restrictions and of the tech policy impact are approximately symmetric, but the data for the phone holders is skewed right (centered lower). 

Many seniors purportedly did not use their phones in class to begin with, resulting in a large number of neutral ratings Some are also neutral because the de jure restrictions are not always enforced. Other seniors are seeing an increase in their own attention spans and in-class concentration, rating the restrictions positively. Others are agitated because they find the restrictions excessive. 

Even those who agree with the general restrictions, however, do not support the wall-mounted phone holders. Aside from those who hold a neutral stance, only 27 gave any positive rating and 17 from that group gave ratings greater than or equal to 7 (Only 15.60% of seniors think the holders are more than slightly positive). There was a common sentiment among seniors that we were suddenly distrusted and being treated like small children, with some even calling the holders “stupid.” Those who were milder in their resentment of the pockets cited traffic bottlenecks that delayed moving between classes by minutes at a time, and also worried about the method that their phones were stored. There have been several instances where the holders detached from the wall, in part or in full; forgetting phones inside them was another concern. Despite all the negative feedback, it was universally agreed that the wall-mounted holders were a rare sight and only used in less than five senior-year courses.

Most seniors see the current gross impact of the new policies as somewhat positive, but not completely positive. While less people are distracting themselves and others with technology, there are obvious disadvantages they are facing. A key point of scrutiny is the decision to restrict all outside computers, as many are dissatisfied with school-issued Chromebooks. When applying for colleges, programs, or scholarships, usage of personal emails is borderline necessary (logging in, two-factor authentication, etc.), something with severely limited access on chromebooks. The GenAI policy changes are largely well received.