At least one Kansas district is projecting $150,000 to $180,000 just to equip secondary students with individual phone lockers, according to the Wichita Eagle. The state provided zero dedicated funding. Every dollar comes from local budgets.
Districts choosing fabric locking pouches — think Yondr, the magnetic-lock system concert venues use to keep audiences present — face an estimated $30 per unit. Statewide, the Kansas Division of the Budget put that figure at roughly $13.4 million if every student received one, according to the Lawrence KS Times. Lockers require a steeper upfront investment. Neither option came with a state check attached.
Legislators passed the policy. The price tag was someone else’s problem.



I mean I’ve seen a lot more money wasted on much dumber shit.
Kids aren’t going to learn if they’ve got handheld social media internet gaming consoles with them in school. I wouldn’t have. They’re not going to willingly put them away for hours every day. I wouldn’t have. So…lock the fuckers up. These kids need to be educated so I’m not being taken care of by drooling Idiocracy background actors when I’m in end-of-life care. There’s way too much stupid going around already.
To be clear, 180k is too much. I’m just saying I agree with locking the goddamn things up.
“If you take your phone out you get detention.” I don’t see why this doesn’t work anymore. Do parents have no control over their kids anymore? You get detention twice, 3rd time suspended, suspended twice 3rd time expelled. If I got suspended from school for taking my phone out my parents would have simply taken away the phone.
“Do parents have no control over their kids?”
Almost never had. Control is an illusion.
Telling them they’re being controlled encourages innovations…so it’s kind of a fucked ouroboros
I think you just answered your own question.
Clearly we’ve reached the stage of physically taking and locking their phones up during school hours because verbal threats weren’t working. If parents had control of what their kids were doing when not in close proximity to them, this wouldn’t be happening.
Lot of dumb adults out there these days. I think a lot of parents would be on the “but I need to contact them in case of emergencies” and “you’re threatening my child’s rights” boat if they just floated the idea of suspension for phone use. So now we’re at the physically confiscate them upon entering like contraband stage.
I need to contact them in case of an emergency doesn’t mean the phone is out. Also the only emergency that matters is if the kid is in danger and needs to call someone. If Dad falls down a flight of stairs and breaks his neck you either A, go pick the kid up from school or B tell him when he gets out of school. The kid isn’t a paramedic.
Also kids don’t have rights at school. That’s why they have the ability to search all their lockers, backpacks, and vehicles without a warrant.
There is no law that says you have a right to have your phone in your hand, or it would be illegal to seperate us from them to go through metal detectors and such at airports, courts, etc
Kids have no hope these days. Who gives a shit if you get detention? It won’t change your future.
Getting expelled from a school most definitely should effect your future. Alternative schools have never been known to be fun. They also don’t usually have buses that come near you, so parents are going to hate having to drive you there, and if they aren’t going you wind up in a situation where the kid gets taken by child protective services, and that’s not a system that has great futures for kids either.