UNESCO CALLS FOR GLOBAL BAN ON MOBILE PHONES IN SCHOOLS

VIENNA, JULY 26 (ONASA) – Smartphones should be banned in schools in order to solve the inattention of students during classes, improve learning itself and help protect children from cyberbullying, are the recommendations of UNESCO, the UN agency for education, science and culture.
UNESCO said there is evidence that excessive mobile phone use is linked to reduced educational performance and that screen time negatively affects children’s emotional stability.
It said UNESCO’s call to ban smartphones sent a clear message that digital technology as a whole, including artificial intelligence, should always be subordinated to a “human-centred vision of education” and never replace face-to-face interaction with teachers.
UNESCO warned those who are also creators of “new learning methods” against reckless acceptance of digital technology, arguing that its positive impact on learning outcomes and economic efficiency could be overestimated, and that something new is not always necessarily better.
“Not all changes represent progress. Just because something is new and newly designed, does not necessarily mean that it should be immediately applied everywhere,” it concludes.
Given that online learning is becoming more common, especially at universities, UNESCO appeals not to neglect the “social dimension” of education in which students have face-to-face lectures.
“The digital revolution has immeasurable potential, but just as warnings have been issued about how it should be regulated in society, similar attention must be paid to how it is used in education,” UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay said, according to the Guardian.
While the technology could potentially open up learning opportunities for millions of people on the planet, the benefits have been unevenly distributed, with many poorer people around the world effectively excluded, it said.
Digital educational infrastructure was expensive, and its environmental costs often underestimated.