CYP Now - Children's Commissioner urged to expand research into school mobile phone bans

The Children’s Commissioner for England has been urged by researchers to use her statutory powers to extend research into the benefits of phone bans in schools after an initial study showed such policies led to improved outcomes for children.

Policy Exchange has called for Rachel de Souza to extend evidence bases into mobile phone bans. Picture: Adobe Stock/ LincB

A new report by think tank the Policy Exchange highlights the correlation between mobile phone bans and better GCSE grades and Ofsted ratings.

The Policy Exchange submitted Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to 800 primary and secondary schools across the UK to establish the link between school performance and mobile phone bans in schools. Schools reported whether they had ‘effective bans’, ‘ban but phone present’, ‘partial bans' or ‘no bans’.

Some 84% of primary schools had ‘effective bans’, compared with 11% of secondary schools. Many schools with effective bans had a higher proportion of pupils eligible for free school meals (FSM), bucking the national trend of FSM being linked with lower attainment, according to the report.

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