France to Ban Mobile Phones for Students under 15 in Experiment

France is launching an experiment to ban mobile phones in schools for students under the age of 15, which aims to give children a ‘digital pause’ that, if found to be successful, could be extended to the whole country from the beginning of 2025.

This was reported by The Guardian.

Just under 200 secondary schools will take part in the experiment, which will require children to hand in their phones upon arrival at school. The ban on the devices goes further than a 2018 law that banned primary and secondary school students from using phones on school grounds but allowed them to keep them with them.

Announcing the trial on Tuesday, acting Education Minister Nicole Belloubet said the aim was to give young people a ‘digital pause’. If the experiment proves successful, the ban will be introduced in all schools from January, Belloubet said.

The commission, set up by President Emmanuel Macron, expressed concern that children's excessive screen time is detrimental to their health and development.

The 140-page report, published in March, concluded that there is ‘a very clear consensus on the direct and indirect negative impact of digital devices on sleep, sedentary lifestyles, lack of physical activity and the risk of overweight and even obesity... as well as on vision’.

The report says that the ‘hyper’ use of phones and other digital technologies is not only harmful to children, but also to ‘society and civilisation’.

The report recommends that children's mobile phone use should be monitored in stages: no mobile phones before the age of 11, mobile phones without internet access between the ages of 11 and 13, and phones with internet access but no access to social media by the age of 15.

She also suggested that children under three should not have access to digital devices at all, which she said were ‘not necessary for the healthy development of a child’.

Banning phones in schools has long been discussed across Europe. In countries where such bans exist, they are most often limited to their use and do not require children to hand them in.

In Germany, there are no formal restrictions, but most schools have banned the use of mobile phones and digital devices in classrooms, except for educational purposes. A quasi-ban has been in place in Dutch secondary school classrooms since the beginning of this year, but as a recommendation rather than a legal obligation. From this school year, the directive will also apply to primary schools.

Italy was an early adopter of the phone ban, introducing it in 2007, then relaxing it in 2017 and reintroducing it in 2022. This applies to all age groups.

In February this year, the British government issued guidance to schools ‘to ban the use of mobile phones during the school day’, but said that decisions on phone use policies should be made by individual headteachers and governors.

Portugal is experimenting with a compromise, introducing a few phone-free days in schools each month, while in Spain, schools in some autonomous regions have introduced a ban, but there is no nationwide ban.

Members of the new Dutch government cannot use phones, smartwatches or tablets during their meetings - they are kept in a safe for fear of espionage.