Flint, MI — While Flint Community Schools (FCS) students will return to class this morning, their cell phones and hoodies are now required to stay at home.
On Dec. 13, 2023, the FCS Board of Education voted unanimously to amend the district’s Code for Student Conduct to disallow hoodies, cell phones, and “personal electronic devices” both within school buildings and on school buses.
The change will take effect today, as FCS scholars are returning to school from their holiday break.
Though the Board’s vote count was unanimous, some trustees said they still held concerns about the implementation and ethics of the amendments.
Trustee Melody Relerford asked about how communication will work for guardians who need to reach their students during the school day, noting that in-room phones and PA systems have been faulty across buildings, and sometimes callers have to leave messages instead of reaching a person directly in school offices.
“That is something that we need to — that we’re looking into right now,” Ernest Steward, the district’s Student Services and Centralized Enrollment Director, replied.
He added that not all rooms have phones, either, so for the interim, a school employee would be sent to relay a message if in-room technology fails.
“It would just seem like we’re solving a problem, but we’re creating some more problems because it doesn’t seem like we’re prepared to have a backup in case something happens for families to be able to communicate with the school,” Relerford added.
Steward said the district’s IT department was going through every building to ensure phones were working properly.
Laura MacIntyre, the Board’s assistant secretary/treasurer, said the new amendments were “school-to-prison pipeline stuff” to her, and while she respected that they were offered from a place of safety concern and limiting distractions for students, not being allowed to have a phone could also present other safety issues as well.
“The buses are irregular, what if you miss the bus?” she asked, adding that it seems unfair to penalize students who aren’t “abusing” cell phone privileges, or may need an electronic device for medical purposes.
“Plus you’re banning hoodies? That’s just, that’s a horrible look,” she said.
“I just want to reiterate that both of these requests are for the safety of our children. And I’m going to put safety over ‘look’ any day,” Steward replied.
The code amendments follow a series of publicized safety concerns at Flint Schools over the past few months.
One such incident occurred in September 2023 at Southwestern Classical Academy, the district’s high school. It was captured on a video that was quickly posted on social media.
The video showed a teacher falling to the ground after being hit with a chair thrown by a 15-year-old student, who later faced felonious assault charges and made a public apology to the teacher, who went to the hospital but reportedly returned to work after the incident.
The story was reported not only locally, but nationally and internationally – which Karen Christian, president of United Teachers of Flint, noted during public comment on Dec. 13.
“We’ve had a lot of situations that have happened at several of the schools this year so far,” she said. “And with the fact that we’ve had fights that have been videotaped and put to the media that everyone has seen, and the fact that we have fights that happen — I’ve seen several videos where kids have their hoodies on and throw a hoodie over their head and start fighting so nobody can figure out who they are — we need to do something to make sure that our students are safe, to make sure that our staff is safe and to make sure that our buildings are run orderly.”
Christian added that she didn’t want all Flint students to be looked at poorly because “two or three people can’t do the right thing.”
“We need our kids to be looked at positively because they have so much … to give to this community and to the state and to other states if they choose to go there after college is over. So we need to do what we can to make sure that they are safe, we are safe, and that people don’t look down on us,” she concluded.
During the Board’s discussion, FCS Superintendent Kevelin Jones assured the trustees that his administration had spoken with all stakeholders about the amendments, including not just the teachers’ union, but also student council members, Southwestern’s entire staff, elementary school principals, and more.
“We have had conversations about this, and this is the conclusion,” he said of the amendments before the Board.
Jones added that if the code changes end up causing harm, or need further refinement, that can still happen as leaders learn how the amendments work or don’t work.
“The realization is policing it [cell phone use] has caused more work and more time away from instruction than not just having them [cell phones] in the building at all. Policing it is a problem,” he said. “So I would like us to move forward with it… And if it’s something we come back to and see that there’s a different way later, let’s do it in reverse instead of saying ‘no.’”
The Board voted 7-0 to approve both amendments, with a note that the language regarding cell phones would be updated to include information on medical exceptions.