[4/8/04]Reports of students cheating by using text messages on cell phones in other districts and the fact that many students carry phones have local public and parochial school officials revising their policies on electronic devices.

“We know the capability of cheating is there,” said Vicksburg High School Principal Charlie Tolliver.

He added that the school had no evidence that students had cheated by using their phones, but said, “Kids are so smart, and if they’ve got the technology, they can use it.”

He said about 65 to 70 percent of the students at VHS carry cell phones. It is against the Vicksburg Warren School District’s policy to have a cell phone on campus.

Warren Central High School Principal Mack Douglas said he had no documentation to support the number of cell phones on campus, but added, “I’m sure there are large numbers of them here. We deal on a regular basis with students reporting their cell phones stolen, and that ties up our time with a problem we shouldn’t be dealing with,” he said. “There is no need for students to have cell phones at school.”

Some cell phones are equipped to silently send and receive written communications, taking the “note passing” of yesteryear to a new level.

Superintendent James Price said the VWSD has no reports of students using text messages to send test answers to each other, but there are other problems with the phones.

“Our attention was drawn to cell phones and their usage with the recent bomb threats,” Price said. Two of the four bomb threats at the district’s two high schools this year were made from cell phones. One of them was reportedly made from a teacher’s cell phone, stolen moments before the bogus 911 call was made.

Price said informal surveys asked teachers and students to estimate how many students were carrying phones into classrooms. A tally found that about 45 percent of high school students carry a phone.

“It’s hard to get definite numbers, though, because students realize if they’re caught, the phones are taken from them,” Price said.

The policy at the VWSD states that the first time a student is found in possession of an electric device, the item is collected, and a parent is asked to pick up the item from school officials. The second time, the item is kept until the end of the semester.

In addition to cell phones, the district’s policy forbids pagers, beepers, radios and CD players from campuses.

Peter Pikul, principal of Vicksburg Catholic School, said cheating has not been a problem at St. Aloysius High School, but that administrators are looking at making punishment stiffer on cell phone users.

The school’s policy now requires students caught using their phones to pick them up at the end of the day; the second offense requires parents to retrieve the phone.

“We’re looking at our options, and we’ll probably tighten up on the punishment” he said.

Price and Tolliver said cell phones are slim and are easily concealed.

“Cell phones are not allowed, but we don’t go out searching people and patting them down,” Tolliver said. “If a student has a phone out and is using it, we collect it.”

Price said administrators will meet this summer with students, parents, teachers and community members to develop a revised cell phone policy.

“We understand that parents give children a phone to check in from time to time after school for safety reasons,” he said. “We will have to find some middle ground that we can reach that protects the integrity of the classroom and at the same time affords the additional security a cell phone provides.”