Los Angeles Unified School District is set to stop giving devices to its youngest students, becoming the first major district to draw a hard line against school screens for early grades. The move comes after a sweeping resolution passed last month by the Los Angeles school board and will take effect in the fall.
The policy requires the district to eliminate devices until second grade, set daily and weekly screen limits for older students, block YouTube on school devices and keep laptops away from elementary and middle school lunch and recess. The district will also audit its education technology contracts, which the teachers’ union says total $1.6 billion.
Just a few years ago, public schools across the U.S. were racing to put a laptop in every child’s hands. Los Angeles is now moving in the opposite direction as concern grows that schools pushed technology too far, too fast. At least 14 states have proposed laws to limit screen time in schools, according to Ballotpedia, and the federal government issued an advisory last week warning that excessive screen use among youth is becoming a growing public health concern.
For families like Katie Pace’s, the shift lands in the middle of daily life, not in a policy memo. Pace said she keeps screens tightly controlled at home, with one family iPad, one television, no screen time during the week and no screens in bedrooms. Her eighth grade daughter, Clementine, does not have a phone, but she still spends a school day surrounded by devices. Clementine watches YouTube videos on her school Chromebook during the 30-minute ride to school on a Wi-Fi-enabled school bus. In Spanish class, assignments are on Duolingo. She said many students use Google Translate for answers. In algebra, she writes with her finger on a touch screen to solve equations. In history, quizzes, tests and writing assignments are on the computer, and almost all homework is online.
Anna Soffer, who teaches sixth-grade English and history in Los Angeles, said she prefers pen-and-paper work but is still required to use laptops and online apps for some activities. “The idea was that technology is the future, so we need to put tech in every child’s hands,” she said. But she added that the Chromebook is “just a world of distraction,” and described the daily struggle of competing with games and apps for students’ attention: “Every day, I’m battling, ’Who would you rather listen to, Ms. Soffer or Minecraft?’”
The district’s new rules fit into a broader backlash that began with parents pushing for school cellphone bans, which have now become common. Many of those same parents now say school-issued devices are the new problem after phones were restricted. In Los Angeles, that frustration has turned into a formal crackdown, and the fall rollout will be closely watched by other districts weighing whether the next fight over student attention is happening in pockets or on screens.
