Oregon teachers and students navigate cellphones, AI and more

Class is now back in session for students across Oregon. Schools are navigating a new statewide ban on cellphones in the classroom, as well as the growing use of artificial intelligence among both students and educators. Meanwhile, aggressive federal immigration enforcement tactics have raised fears in some communities that schools could become hotspots for arrests.

Natalie Pate covers K-12 education for OPB. She joins us to talk about these issues and more.

Note: The following transcript was transcribed digitally and validated for accuracy, readability and formatting by an OPB volunteer.

Dave Miller: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Dave Miller. School is now back in session for students across Oregon. Districts are navigating a new statewide ban on cell phones, as well as the growing use of artificial intelligence among both students and educators. Meanwhile, aggressive federal immigration enforcement tactics have raised fears in some communities that schools could become hotspots for arrests.

Natalie Pate covers K-12 education for OPB. She’s been reporting on all these issues, and she joins us now. Natalie, welcome back.

Natalie Pate: Thanks for having me, Dave.

Miller: What were Governor Kotek’s reasons for this statewide ban on cell phones in classrooms?

Pate: Yeah. So when her executive order came out this summer, she pointed to wanting to give students a sense of belonging, support and the joy of learning something new, and how cell phones took away from that. And she particularly pointed to a trifecta of effects from cell phones: mental health issues, safety in school and distraction from learning. [This] echoes a lot of very similar arguments that are in favor of bans at local schools and that we heard at the state level, even though a similar bill to this in the legislature this past spring didn’t make it out of the session.

Miller: So what specifically is the governor requiring?

Pate: She’s requiring a bell to bell ban, which is an all day ban. But policy details are up to the individual districts. So the executive order does require that they have to specify how they’re going to store the phones during the day, for example. They also have to say what happens if a student violates the policy, but the order does say that they can’t punish a student in a way that results in additional lost instructional time. So they can’t give a suspension or an expulsion. And it can allow for exceptions, such as for students with disabilities who might need those devices to access their education.

Miller: What’s the timeline? I mean, when do districts have to have something in place?

Pate: Well, they have to adopt a policy by October 31 and the policies have to be in full effect no later than January 1. But those are kind of smack dab in the middle of the first term and of the school year, so I am starting to see some schools start sooner this year to make that transition a little bit easier.

Miller: As opposed to just saying, “OK, you can have cell phones” and then three months in, “OK, now for real, you can’t have cell phones.”

Pate: Exactly, exactly.

Miller: What school districts had bans in place?

Pate: Well, I mean, several already do. Portland Public Schools, Oregon’s largest school district, notably adopted a policy last school year. But some individual schools within districts – I was just in Salem-Kaizer this week [and] they have several variations between their high schools – had enacted bans or limits of some kind before. So it varies greatly, but schools have been looking at this for a while.

Miller: And how’s it been going?

Pate: Well, it is early days for some of those policies. I think generally speaking, I hear particularly from educators that students seem far more focused in the classrooms and interestingly that the social interactions are a lot greater in the hallway, in cafeterias. They’re talking to each other, engaging more, participating in clubs more, things like that. And there are, of course, plenty of annoyances with those growing pains of getting those policies in place too.

Miller: What are the other districts – the ones who now have to do this for the first time – thinking about as they craft their policies? I mean, what challenges do they foresee?

Pate: Well, during the legislative discussion and when the executive order came out, one of the big questions was, is this the role of the state to decide this – which the executive order putting the individual policies to the individual districts kind of sidesteps that. But the other big component of that is the cost, because depending on how a district decides to store the phones … We frequently hear about Yondr pouches or something similar. Those are not cheap. Those are not free, right? So this requirement from the state, some have seen as an unfunded mandate. Like you’re making us do this, but you’re not giving us the money to do it. So the cost of pouches or storage is a big one.

The other big one, I would say, is emergency situations. Unfortunately, the fatal shooting at a Minnesota school at the beginning of this year, at a Catholic school, was an awful reminder of that. And there are concerns that, how do we reach mass amounts of parents in an emergency? And then there’s also concerns with other small details of implementation. For example, are students going to leave campus during lunch so that they can use their phones, instead of accessing free or reduced price meals that are available to them?

Miller: What have you heard from students about this?

Pate: Well, I would say students are generally OK with it. They’re annoyed with some things, like the pouches – I admit that I have not heard many positive things about the pouches from students – and the lunch restrictions. But they get it for class, from what I’ve heard from students. I’ve talked with students around the state over the last year, but here are some thoughts from a group of students who I spoke to at West Salem High School yesterday where the full ban is newly in effect:

[Recording from West Salem High School playing]

Student 1: … neutral. I don’t mind a whole lot. I mean, I don’t know.

Student 2: Yeah. I mean, I don’t use my phone in class very much, so I do think it’s a little annoying that I can’t just use it in the hallways, like text my mom or something. But I’m not really mad about it, yeah.

Student 3: I just want to be able to listen to music.

[Recording ends]

Pate: And another student told me …

Miller: That’s all I want too, I just want to listen to music. [Laughs]

Pate: I know, I loved that. They were like, yeah, I just want to be able to listen to my music. But another student also told me that she’s more worried about those individual emergencies. Like if you have a medical emergency and you want to text your parent, you forgot your medications at home or something like that, or sometimes it’s embarrassing to have to go to the front office and say, “Hey, I need to call my mom about this.”

Miller: I want to turn to artificial intelligence. What do the state’s guidelines say about the pros and the cons of AI in schools?

Pate: Yeah, well, so fun fact … According to the Oregon Department of Education, they were the first state to release statewide guidelines specifically on generative AI in public K-12 schools – that was back in 2023. And the guidelines are largely a collection of resources and arguments around AI and education to consider if a district is going to craft a policy. So some of those pros that we hear, it can cut down time on administrative tasks for teachers. It allows teachers to tailor lessons to individual students more easily.

Students can use it as a tool, right? They can use it to create study questions or even compare their work to a grading rubric to get feedback before they turn in an assignment. But the cons that we hear about, there are studies that show that an overreliance on AI can be harmful to cognitive processing, especially for young, developing minds. That’s also true for this real life social relationship aspect. There’s definitely a dependence for some young people to have the AI characters as friends or even using AI as their therapists, and that’s had some negative ramifications. And it can also be used for things like bullying and sexual harassment. We’ve seen that and we’ve also heard a lot of concerns about students using this to cheat academically.

Miller: OK, so that’s the student side, but what do the guidelines say about how teachers or staff should or should not use generative AI?

Pate: That’s right. Experts say, regardless, it should be a tool for students. It’s not something that does all the work for them or stops critical thinking. And that’s true for staff as well. But the main thing I hear from the educator side of things is that it should be used in a way to help them improve their instruction, not something that replaces instruction.

And I’m hearing about that concern mostly from staff themselves, this fear that if districts are in a budget crunch, for example, is it cheaper for them to pay for an AI tutoring program rather than paying for staff and personnel to do that more high quality instruction? That’s definitely a concern that’s out there. But the state guidelines do emphasize having regular training and professional development for staff, as well as for students, in order to use these tools ethically and responsibly.

Miller: What do we know about the governor’s deal with Nvidia to get AI education into Oregon classrooms?

Pate: Yeah, Oregon Capital Chronicle reported on this back in July. To my knowledge, the details on this partnership are still pretty scarce. Initial details do show that this partnership seems to mostly be focused on colleges and universities, so it might have an impact in K-12, but we’re still kind of figuring out what that’s going to look like on the ground. Big picture though, it does make Oregon one of several states who are making deals with this trillion dollar chip maker to get AI in local schools.

Miller: In January, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security rescinded President Biden era guidelines that basically prohibited immigration officers from arresting migrants at sensitive locations like schools or churches. How has that changed the back-to-school mood in communities you’ve talked to?

Pate: It’s been tough. It’s definitely a somber topic for a lot of families. I’ve heard from educators, parents, students that they’re worried ICE arrests will happen at schools or when they’re at school. So there’s a lot of fear there.

Miller: You spoke to educators in Woodburn recently, where the vast majority of students, as well as a significant portion of teachers and staff are Hispanic or Latino. What did you hear?

Pate: Yeah, there’s growing concerns that ICE officers will target Oregon schools for arrests, including at bus stops or high traffic times like when parents are picking up or dropping off their kids. It’s also affecting just daily life for a lot of people, including parent and longtime Woodburn educator, Amalia Moreno.

Amalia Moreno [recording]: We can’t have normal activities take place because there’s been community celebrations that we’re not even comfortable attending, because part of our family can be taken away. As a community member and a head of household, I’m the one that’s having to do all of the outings in my family because I am a U.S. citizen, thankfully.

So, I still go out and do everything. I don’t mind that. Even though I go out and do my shopping and everything that my family needs, I still fear for myself because I am not Anglo-Saxon, I’m not white. I’m very Mexican.

Pate: And I will note that like Amalia, many Latino community members are U.S. citizens and this issue isn’t just affecting especially diverse communities like Woodburn. We’re hearing about it across the state.

Miller: How can that kind of stress affect a student’s academic performance?

Pate: Very much. I mean, any student, in that heightened sense of fight or flight, that fear, can struggle to focus. If they’re worried about a mom or a dad not being there when they get home, that takes a big toll on them, not just academically and mentally, but socially and emotionally.

Miller: What resources or guidance is out there for families who may be unsure of their rights?

Pate: Well, families should know that there are some protections in place … and I’m going to look more closely at my notes for this because I want to make sure that I have this information correct for everyone. But first, it’s important to know that Oregon public schools are legally obligated to educate every child between the ages of 5 and 18 who haven’t completed through 12th grade, and that’s regardless of immigration status of either the student or their parents.

The state law does also protect students’ education records from being used for immigration action. And according to the Immigrant Legal Resources Center, ICE officials can enter public areas of a school, but they still need authorization from school officials or a judicial warrant to enter private spaces. So schools are advising staff to not give out any information to officers and instead direct them to an administrator. And if you or your family is looking for more information, you can ask for your school’s protocols and you can reach out to local immigration rights groups.

Miller: What else stood out to you in your conversations about the beginning of this school year?

Pate: Well, kind of coming off of the topic about ICE arrests, there have been a lot of federal changes since President Trump took office again in January and at times it can be hard to keep up with the changes. There’s been a lot of cuts or threats to cuts of funding, some changes to programs, the U.S. Department of Ed, how all of those changes affect schools, preschools and programs that happen here locally. But I spoke to a teacher at Hoover Elementary School in Salem yesterday. Her name is Holly and I think she summed up the sentiment that I’ve heard repeatedly from local educators really well when she said this:

Holly [recording]: I think that there’s a lot of hype around the politics side of it . And I think for us, as teachers, and for our students, we’re still showing up every day, right? So whether we have enough supplies or whether we have enough time, we are showing up and we’re gonna continue to teach our kids, make connections and love our kids, and the kids are gonna do the same. They’re gonna show up, they’re gonna love us, they’re gonna try to learn. So I think we’re just excited to be here and to prepare these future generations because we don’t have time to lose, honestly.

Miller: Natalie, thanks very much.

Pate: Thanks for having me.

Miller: Natalie Pate is OPB’s K-12 education reporter.

“Think Out Loud®” broadcasts live at noon every day and rebroadcasts at 8 p.m.

If you’d like to comment on any of the topics in this show or suggest a topic of your own, please get in touch with us on Facebook, send an email to thinkoutloud@opb.org, or you can leave a voicemail for us at 503-293-1983.