Dear Families,
We want to let you know about a change taking shape across our schools this year: a renewed, district-wide effort to reduce unnecessary screen time for students, both at school and at home.
Like many families, we've seen the research on kids and screens with growing concern. Jonathan Haidt's book The Anxious Generation lays out evidence connecting the rise of smartphones and constant screen access with increases in anxiety, depression, and disrupted attention among children and teens. That research, along with new state law requiring schools to limit smartphone use during the school day, and other California districts (including Los Angeles Unified) rolling back school-issued device time, has prompted us to take a close look at our own 1:1 device program.
Here is what you can expect moving forward:
- Devices will be used at school more strategically — reserved for tasks that genuinely benefit from them, rather than as a default for every assignment.
- At-home use of school-issued devices will be limited to situations that are genuinely necessary, chosen strategically rather than out of routine. For our first grade families specifically: this year serves as a transition, after which first grade devices will generally no longer come home starting with the 2027–28 school year.
- We encourage you to build your own household guidelines around screen time, and we're happy to share resources if that would help.
As a reminder, our school-issued devices already have built-in curfews, developed with input from staff at each school site, so devices simply stop working outside of school hours: 1st and 2nd grade iPads operate between 6:00 a.m. and 8:30 p.m. on school days and are not operational at all on weekends, devices for grades 3–6 operate between 6:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. 7 days per week, and devices for grades 7–8 operate between 6:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. 7 days per week. High school devices currently do not have a curfew.
If you're looking for guidance on managing screen time at home, Common Sense Media, the same organization we use for our digital citizenship and AI literacy instruction, offers free, age-appropriate resources and lessons specifically about screen time that many of our families have found helpful.
As a school district, we want our own practices to reflect what we're learning: that less unstructured screen time, and more purposeful, strategic use, helps kids learn and thrive. We appreciate your partnership as we work through this transition together, and we welcome your questions or feedback at any point.
Thank you for your partnership and for everything you do for our students.
