Students should be allowed full use of their cell phones during school hours.

I would also like to apologize to anyone who was watching this debate, only to see it fizzle out due to my inaction. In the future, I will make a special effort to be on time with my arguments. Since it's been so long, I'll start by briefly reviewing my three points from Round 1: Point 1. A cell phone is just another item, and making it special contraband makes it just that much more irresistible for students to use. Point 2. Cell phones offer an opportunity to socialize our students regarding their proper use—banning them makes demonstration of responsible use impossible. Point 3. Parents want their children to be able to use cell phones, and the educational process runs more smoothly when parents are happy. In his First Round argument, my opponent offers several objections to my points—and each and every one of his objections is either irrelevant, based on fuzzy logic, or a deliberate misinterpretation of my words. I'll now respond to his objections. 1. He claims that most students do not have a significant relationship with their teachers, and he's probably right. This concession does not weaken my argument: I was only saying that the iron-fisted cell phone ban is just one more obstacle toward building these relationships, which can increase student achievement where they do exist. If few students have significant relationships with their teachers, and such relationships are an invaluable aid in learning, shouldn't we seize an opportunity to make them more likely to develop? He later says that taking the phone will destroy the relationship, but this same situation occurs under the status quo, with one significant difference: Under the status quo, teachers are taking cell phones for no reason other than "that's the rule"; If cell phones were not banned, a teacher would only take a cell phone for a clear reason. Students still wouldn't be happy, but at least more of them would think this is fair. 2. He says that I acknowledged that students use phones to cheat on tests. I said nothing about cheating, but I'll respond to this anyway, and also to his Point 2, which was that cell phones let students cheat on tests and break the law by dealing drugs and challenging other students to fights. My response is simple: students did all of these things before cell phones existed. A teacher can easily forbid cell phones during testing, the same way that a teacher tells students to clear their desks of extraneous papers before testing. And come on: Is a drug dealing student likely to pay attention to a cell phone ban? He might not use the phone inside the classroom, but he's going to find a way. My opponent concedes as much when he says that students "abuse [being able to use a cell phone to cheat on a test] even with the rule that prohibits all cell phone use at any time during the school day. " So what's the point of the rule? In my opinion, having a rule that doesn't work is far more damaging than having no rule at all. 3. My opponent claims that a disturbance would result in class from a continuous give and take of the phone, but there is no reason a phone couldn't be confiscated long term like any other item. 4. My opponent confuses *socialization*, which I clearly defined as "preparing our young people to conduct themselves in a socially acceptable manner in the outside world", with *socializing*. I never said that students needed cell phones to socialize. I said that removing the ban gives teachers an opportunity *to socialize them* by teaching them about respectful cell phone use in the outside world. In sum, my opponent offered many objections, but none of them hurt my argument and some may have even strengthened it. Now, I will attempt to offer clear objections to my opponent's argument that cell phone use should be banned—or, as he concedes to the middle ground, at least severely limited. Point 1. My opponent admits that students need cell phones to connect to their parents, but also says, "Unless some emergency has occurred, the student's cell phone should be off. " This assertion assumes that all emergencies happen inside the school—otherwise it is ridiculous. What if the emergency happens at home, or at the parent's work? How is the student supposed to know to turn on his or her cell phone to receive the call about this emergency? Far more logical is for individual teachers to set the policy that all cell phones be set to vibrate during class time. Simple conversations with parents can be conducted via text messaging. If a student has an emergency, he or she can step out of the classroom to conduct that conversation. If the student starts having "emergencies" on a regular basis, of course the teacher will intervene. Point 2. I have already responded to my opponent's concerns about cell phones allowing cheating and illegal activities. Again—all of these things happened before cell phones existed. Point 3. His third point is that students should not be allowed full use of their cell phones because cell phones require their own rules and regulations. This is not a point, but rather an opinion and a conclusion. No new reasoning is presented with this "point". My opponent concedes that students need cell phones to be in contact with their parents. He admits that students use cell phones to cheat even when cell phones are banned. In his conclusion, he argues for a limited ban on cell phones, essentially the status quo at my school. Students can turn their cell phones on after school, and that's that. But that's not enough, because a ban always invites the question of *why? *. The substance of my opponent's argument is that cell phones allow students to do bad things and disrupt the learning environment. Well, we've already seen that students will do bad things with or without the latest technology. So, cell phones are a disruption. They certainly *can* be a disruption, but if expectations for their respectful use are made clear by individual teachers then they will not be a disruption. Far more disruptive, I argue, is a ban—even a limited ban, like my opponent proposes. The constant "no questions asked" confiscation of cell phones disrupts tenuous teacher-student relationships. Forcing students to turn off their phones during the school day disrupts the line of communication between parents and their children. Banning cell phones and then having students see teachers make calls on a cell phone disrupts the ability of a teacher to model proper behavior for students. Not teaching and trusting students to make responsible, respectful choices with their cell phones disrupts the delicate process of their socialization.