Stitt Announces Weak, Toothless ‘Challenge’ to Ban Smartphones in Oklahoma Classrooms…

Put down your phone and take seat! I have some scary, breaking news to report – I agree with Kevin Stitt on something regarding Oklahoma education! 

Well, at least I think I do. 

Earlier this week, Kevin Stitt issued an executive order creating the “Oklahoma Phone-Free Schools Challenge.” 

Surprisingly, it doesn’t call for public schools to replace their phone systems with telegraphs, which would further harm their enrollment and send more kids to private schools.

It actually weakly addresses one of the most annoying and entitled perks that today’s public school kids have – the ability to bring phones and mobile devices into the classroom!

Here’s a video that Stitt issued about the directive:

First of all, let’s give kudos to the auteur in Stitt’s social media department who thought up that video angle shift at the 50-second mark. That’s definitely going to win him or her a political propaganda Heartland Emmy!

Second, that’s actually not a bad idea by Stitt. 

Although banning phones in schools will mean fewer viral high school fight videos clogging up your social media feed, I’m still for it.

As a proud member of the class of '96, I’m just old enough (and lucky enough) to remember what it was like to attend school before it was hit by the tsunamic rush of the Internet, smartphones, and social media. 

It was a glorious time when your parents couldn’t text you in the middle of English class to remind you to clean your room or, worse, ask why you hadn’t responded to their last three messages!

You see, back in my day, the closest thing we had to cell phones – which only existed in movies, music videos, and the cars of rich people – were pagers. Probably because they were A) popularized by drug dealers and B) a distraction, they weren’t allowed in schools. 

That’s why it’s always blown my mind – and makes me jealous – that kids these days get to stroll into class like it's a futuristic Wild West, phones in hand, while trying to pretend they're paying attention to a Bible lesson in history class.

Are we really expecting them to focus on their studies when their SnapChat notifications are blowing up faster than Ryan Walters’ ego at a Moms For Liberty rally?

Kids still use SnapChat right, or is that a dated reference?

Anyway, back to the point.

Stitt’s not completely wrong here.

Sure, his order is weak sauce, and calling it a “challenge” instead of an actual policy shows he doesn’t have the guts to push for real change, but whatever—it’s better than nothing.

Let’s just hope his next big education idea doesn’t involve swapping out Chromebooks for chalkboards and forcing teachers to go back to using abacuses.