Measure Bars Students From Using Cellphones During Class Time

Curbing students’ cellphone use, targeting illegal immigration and preventing COVID-19 mandates, Gov. Ron DeSantis last week signed dozens of bills, including one that will keep his travels under wraps.

The bills passed during the recently completed legislative session, which DeSantis touted as the most “productive” in state history and Democrats lambasted as being filled with “missed opportunities” and “culture war” issues.

Among other things, DeSantis signed a measure (HB 379) that will bar students from using cellphones during class time and curtail use of the social-media platform TikTok on school grounds.

The law is set to take effect in July and will prevent use of cellphones during “instructional time,” unless expressly directed by teachers. Educators also will have to designate areas for the devices during class.

The bill also takes aim at one of the governor’s technological targets, the popular social-media app TikTok. It will prevent the use of TikTok on devices owned by school districts and through internet access provided by districts.

DeSantis described the social-media restrictions as “reining in the use” of the technology in schools.

“Being normal kids, like kids were prior to social media, is important. The social media (causes) more problems than it solves, and I think it causes more harm than good. So, let’s have our education system be as much about traditional education as we can,” DeSantis said.

The governor last week also signed a measure (SB 1616) that will prevent the release of past and future travel records of DeSantis and other state leaders.

The measure provides a public-records exemption for travel records of DeSantis, the governor’s immediate family, the lieutenant governor, Cabinet members, the House speaker, the Senate president and the chief justice of the Florida Supreme Court.

Democrats sharply criticized the bill during the legislative session, contending the exemption would go beyond travel itineraries and also prevent the release of information about where the governor went and who attended meetings and events.

Anders Croy, communications director of a DeSantis opposition group, DeSantis Watch, said in a Twitter post Thursday that the bill was signed a day before DeSantis begins “political trips to Illinois [and] Iowa, [and] amid reports of upcoming donor dinners at the Governor’s Mansion.” DeSantis has been traveling across the country as he prepares for a potential 2024 presidential campaign.

During a media appearance last week, DeSantis said he didn’t “come up” with the travel-records proposal.

“With the security situation, how you do patterns of movements, if you’re somebody that is targeted, which unfortunately I am, and I get a lot of threats, that could be something that could be helpful for people that may not want to do good things,” the governor said.

DeSantis signed the travel-related measure along with 36 other bills, including legislation (HB 1259) that will provide charter schools a new avenue of “capital outlay” funding for such things as purchasing land and facilities. Starting July 1, school districts will be required to share portions of tax revenues using a formula factoring in charter-school enrollment against overall district enrollment.

Ryan Dailey reports for the News Service of Florida.

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