The hottest School Policy Substack posts right now

And their main takeaways
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Top Education Topics

Phones at School: Less Learning, More Loneliness

After Babel • 1633 implied HN points • 17 Mar 26
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. Students who use phones, tablets, or laptops for fun during the school day show bigger drops in standardized test scores in math, reading, and science.
  2. Leisure device use at school replaces face-to-face interaction and is linked to students feeling lonelier during school hours.
  3. Restricting non-educational device use from bell to bell, tightening laptop/tablet controls, or returning younger students to paper and pencil could improve learning and reduce loneliness.

AI Can't Fix Student Engagement

After Babel • 1412 implied HN points • 04 Mar 26
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. Too many students are disengaged from school; only about one in three are highly engaged, and that lack of engagement undermines real learning and long-term outcomes.
  2. Engagement falls into four modes—Passenger, Achiever, Resister, and Explorer—with Explorer mode (curiosity plus agency) as the goal because it supports initiative, deep learning, and resilience.
  3. Parents and schools can move kids toward Explorer mode with concrete actions: model curiosity, give students choice and authentic projects, protect extracurriculars, manage tech, and use tools or workshops to make engagement visible and supported.

Top 5 questions about school vaccination requirements

Your Local Epidemiologist • 877 implied HN points • 11 Mar 26
🏥 Health Politics School Policy
  1. State school vaccination rules are shifting: some states are moving toward stricter medical-only exemptions while others are passing laws to weaken or block requirements, so this will remain a live policy battle, not a settled issue.
  2. School immunization requirements do more than boost vaccine rates — they create routine healthcare visits that catch other health problems and keep kids in school, so weakening them can reduce both vaccination coverage and important points of health access.
  3. When discussing policy, focus on shared values and practical arguments: emphasize keeping schools open, the high cost of outbreaks, and middle-ground fixes like making exemptions harder to obtain or tying them to education rather than eliminating requirements entirely.

Childhood and Education #15: Got To Get Out

Don't Worry About the Vase • 2329 implied HN points • 10 Dec 25
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. If a child is being seriously bullied, the right move is to remove them from that environment or find a different school, not to tell them to toughen up; staying often makes things worse.
  2. Phones in class are a major attention sink, and strict bans with real enforcement tend to reduce disruptions and raise engagement and test scores after an initial adjustment period.
  3. Don’t automatically defer to education 'experts' — parents can use homeschooling, microschools, tutors, or AI effectively and should evaluate options rather than assume traditional schools are always best.

How to Evaluate Phone Policies in Schools

After Babel • 448 implied HN points • 05 Feb 26
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. A free, research-informed toolkit gives schools ready-made surveys and measures to track how phone policies affect students, teachers, administrators, and parents.
  2. It works for both single-school evaluations and large, rigorous studies—Qualtrics formats and optional collaboration with the Stanford Social Media Lab support longitudinal tracking and advanced analysis.
  3. The toolkit adds practical analysis help (a manual scoring guide, a customizable survey builder, and a coming Data Dashboard), but it doesn’t by itself establish definitive causality without stronger study designs.
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5 Actions to Reduce Smartphones in School

The Analog Family • 319 implied HN points • 30 Aug 24
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. Schools should encourage families to delay giving their kids smartphones until high school. This helps kids focus better on their education.
  2. Parents can help by communicating through school offices instead of texting their kids during class. This keeps kids from being distracted by their phones.
  3. Activities and teams should not require smartphones for participation. Schools can find other ways to share information that includes all students.

Are we looking for the cause of Gen Z anxiety in the wrong place?

Make Work Better • 152 implied HN points • 05 Feb 26
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. Children now get much less independence and free, unsupervised play than past generations, which reduces their chance to learn risk‑taking, decision‑making and a sense that their actions matter.
  2. This loss of autonomy helps explain rising mental‑health problems and economic inactivity among young people, and it predates smartphones so screens aren’t the whole story.
  3. Employers and policymakers should rebuild chances to practice independence — accepting some friction and deliberately training initiative, ambiguity tolerance and responsibility in schools and workplaces.

Antisemitism Investigations Hit Three Big Public School Districts

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 445 implied HN points • 24 Nov 25
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. A House committee opened investigations into Fairfax County, Berkeley, and Philadelphia public school districts over allegations they failed to address antisemitism.
  2. The committee has asked each district for anonymized charts of antisemitic complaints and any documents or communications related to antisemitism, Judaism, or Israel.
  3. The probe, led by Republicans on the House Education Committee, warns the districts they could lose federal funding if found to have violated federal law.

How Jonathan Haidt Won the Fight Against Smartphones in Schools

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 4655 implied HN points • 30 Dec 24
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. Having rules about smartphone use in schools helps students connect better with their teachers. Many teachers noticed students paying more attention and being more respectful after limiting phone use.
  2. The shift away from screens in the classroom has made a positive difference in students' behavior and engagement. Teachers are seeing students who are more willing to participate and communicate.
  3. Promoting more unsupervised play can help children develop important social skills. This balance is important to counteract the heavy use of technology in their lives.

Ontario Schools Get a Feeble Phone Policy

The Analog Family • 399 implied HN points • 01 May 24
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. The new cellphone policy in Ontario schools is seen as weak and not based on effective research. It's not enough to just keep phones out of sight to reduce distractions.
  2. Even with the policy, many students still use their phones during class time. Teachers often allow this, which undermines the effort to minimize distractions.
  3. Parents are part of the problem too. Many want stricter rules at school but still send their kids with smartphones, missing the chance to set limits at home.

Schools Need to Ban Smartphones

The Analog Family • 419 implied HN points • 01 Apr 24
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. Smartphones in schools are harmful to student focus and learning. When kids use their phones in class, it distracts them and lowers their grades.
  2. Banning phones can improve the school environment. Schools that already have strict phone rules report better student behavior and more meaningful social interactions.
  3. Parents and schools should work together on this issue. By supporting a ban on smartphones, families can help kids focus better and feel happier at school.

How to (and How NOT to) Mandate Phone-Free Schools

After Babel • 1103 implied HN points • 30 Jan 25
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. More schools are going phone-free, which means students won't use phones during the whole school day. This helps them focus on learning and connecting with friends.
  2. Total phone bans can improve students' grades and attention in class. Teachers also feel less distracted and more engaged with their students.
  3. Policies are being created to guide schools on how to effectively limit phone use. This is often driven by parents who see the negative effects of phones on children.

Maybe K-12 schools should rebrand discipline

Sex and the State • 38 implied HN points • 29 Dec 25
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. Rebrand discipline as assistance: when a student disrupts class, remove them to get help from a counselor or support staff instead of using punishment.
  2. Treat misbehavior as a sign of unmet needs—like home trouble, learning differences, or mental health—because helping those needs is more effective for learning and more ethical than retribution.
  3. Shift resources and policy away from punishment and bloated administration toward counseling, tutoring, vocational options, and flexible learning to reduce racial punishment gaps and better support boys who act out.

School Daze

Living Fossils • 21 implied HN points • 29 Dec 25
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. Modern life—less play, more screens, and rigid schooling—creates mismatches our brains struggle with, and that likely produces more real cases of ADHD, anxiety, and similar problems.
  2. Wider diagnostic definitions plus incentives for schools, parents, clinicians, and students push more people into diagnoses, and social imitation helps these labels spread quickly.
  3. Because there are few objective brain tests and solutions often create new problems, diagnoses can balloon without an effective brake; rebalancing toward community, exercise, and other nonmedical supports could help.

Dropping Out

Comment is Freed • 125 implied HN points • 16 Nov 24
🚌 Education School Policy
  1. England's schools have greatly improved over the last few decades, becoming some of the best in Europe. This success is partly due to effective policies and the integration of immigrant students.
  2. However, since the pandemic, schools have faced serious challenges with increased behavior issues and poor attendance among students. Many children are missing more classes, leading to worries that they might drop out.
  3. To sustain the progress in school standards, the government needs a focused approach that addresses the interconnected issues of attendance, behavior, and mental health. Otherwise, the gains made in education could be lost.