Students returned to WHS this year to find changes in the use of phone hotels, and this has left many among the student body disgruntled. The administrative focus on enforcing handbook guidelines about what students are permitted to do with their phones calls for deeper conversation between students and the administrative body.
In past years, handbook guidelines about use of phones tended to be left under the discretion of the teachers who could either choose to enforce guidelines or practice a bit more leniency. However, every year the school has conversations centered around how they can better implement the ideas in the handbook. Last year the WHS administration has asked teachers to enforce these guidelines more uniformly in their classrooms. This year, headlining this push for enforcement is the more consistent use of phone hotels.
The administration informed some members of the school community before school started about these changes.
“There was an email sent to parents and teachers with an administrative request [to use hotels] as opposed to [teachers deciding for themselves],” art teacher Julie Hom-Mandell said.
Coming into the year, not only are teachers asking their students to put their phones in hotels before class, but many are assigning their use as part of students’ participation grades. These new practices are a product of the administrative request that students were not made aware of until the beginning of the year and have brought the student body to a new level of frustration with what are now annual waves of new regulations.
It’s important to note that this decision did not come out of nowhere, but was rather a product of guidelines that were already in the handbook. However, because the administration used to allow for more leniency with when students could use their phones, there was an unspoken compromise between staff members and students. When these same practices start to become consistently enforced, the disconnect between students and teachers grows larger and larger.
Some students participate in groups that discuss policies like this, though even they were not necessarily involved in these changes.
“[Last year] a lot of people in the principal’s council said they didn’t like [the phone hotels]. [Mr. Peri] didn’t necessarily say anything about removing them, but teachers eventually stopped using them as much,” Caroline Betty, member of the Principal’s Advisory Council, said. “This year they’ve decided to enforce it more.”
In implementing the regulations needed to enforce these expectations, there should always be room for students’ voices to be a part of the process, rather than leaving students the only option of talking about it among themselves. We have to make sure our voices are heard by those who make the rules in order for a compromise to be reached. The WHS administration agrees that student voice is important.
“There’s a lot of opportunities for student voice [at WHS], more than any school I’ve ever heard of,” principal Paul Peri said. “Our students are incredible and they do great things, so we welcome the feedback.”
The School Council, Student Advisory Council (SAC), and Principal’s Advisory Council (PAC) all include students as representatives of a larger student body. Any member of the Weston community is allowed to participate in SAC meetings; this is because the Student Advisory Council meetings involve school committee members, and their meetings are generally open to the public. So students who want to share concerns with the school committee, who approves the Student Handbook, can attend a meeting if they like. The best course of action, however, would be to go through a SAC rep with a proposal, and then get confirmation through them to propose your idea during a SAC meeting.
The Principal’s Advisory Council, which meets once a month, is made up of nearly 20 students who inform the principal of any conflicts or issues among the student body. Unlike the others, PAC membership isn’t very exclusive and welcomes any and all input, however, PAC members must still be selected by the principal.
Finally, the School Council, which meets four times a month, provides the principal with opinions on important issues like budgeting, scheduling, and school policies. The Councils is made up of the principal, parents, teachers, community members, and students.
One thing these committees have in common is that they allow for any student to create a proposal, present it to a student representative, maybe start a petition or survey to know if the rest of the student body is behind them, and then together present that compromise to higher ups. We have potential to hold a large impact on the formation of rules that aren’t required by law, like the phone hotel policy.
Some students already have ideas about how to change the use of phone hotels, for example.
“It should be for freshmen and sophomores. Most of them just came out of middle school and they can’t not look at their phones,” senior George Meade said. “ [But] last year when I was a junior I wasn’t looking at my phone all the time.”
With strong initiative and compromises that aim to satisfy both parties, there’s no reason why we as students can’t have a stronger impact on administrative decisions like the phone hotels.
“There are rules you have to follow, but there could also be compromises,” said METCO academic liaison Tanaja Jordan. “It would take both sides understanding what teachers have to do and what students need.”
