National school cellphone ban: Auckland students find walkie-talkie loophole

A group of Auckland high school students has found a way around the Government’s new cellphone ban with an old piece of kit - walkie-talkies.

One 16-year-old spoke to the Herald about what he and his friends had been using their walkie-talkies for and how he hoped it would catch on with other students.

And none of his teachers had taken any issue with this, he said. Indeed, the coalition Government’s new law does not apply to any devices other than cellphones.

“If the phone ban wasn’t in place then we wouldn’t have had to do this,” the boy behind the walkie-talkies said.

The President of the Secondary Principals’ Association, Vaughan Couillault, was impressed by the student’s “innovation”.

As principal of Papatoetoe High School, Couillault had yet to see students use walkie-talkies but many had “burner phones”.

As the new legislation specifically mentions cellphones, the walkie-talkies would not be confiscated during break times and students were welcome to use them, he said.

The government’s nationwide school phone ban came into effect at the start of Term 2 on April 29, 2024. Photo / 123RF

Other devices students were using instead of phones, mainly to listen to music, were iPods and speakers. Students were also using laptops during break times to communicate with their peers through email, as social media sites were banned on school wifi.

Grant Pollard, the acting leader of the Ministry of Education’s Operations and Integration Group Te Pae Aronui, said regulations only applied to cellphones, not walkie-talkies.

“Most schools have existing BYOD policies around the appropriate use of laptops and tablets,” Pollard.

“Schools can make decisions about the management of other devices like walkie-talkies in consultation with their community.”

Boy sees merits in phone ban, says walkie-talkies avoid pitfalls

The boy behind the walkie-talkies said he and his friends in Year 12 had been using them to talk to each other during morning tea, lunch, and while walking between classes.

“At these times it is mostly just talking about how the class went or anything else random we have thought of. At break times the conversation is more about where we will meet and whether something different is going on like a lunchtime club or a sport,” he said.

He and his three friends have had an enthusiastic reaction from their peers: “I think more people will likely get some too after seeing their usefulness”.

National said banning cellphones in schools would help lift achievement rates. Photo / 123 rf

“I think the cellphone ban has some merits, however, it also has disadvantages that I hope the introduction of walkie-talkies will fix,” he said.

“We first heard about the ban last term and discussed it. Everyone I talked to seemed unhappy about it generally, however, I think most of this comes from how the ban inhibits communication.

“The way I see it, using walkie-talkies both provides a solution to the negative effects of the phone ban and doesn’t cause any of the same problems that the phone ban was designed to address.

“It allows us to communicate without using our phones, but because the walkie-talkies are designed purely for communication they can’t be used as a distraction for games or the internet, a problem that the phone ban seems to have been introduced to solve.”

He said not having phones “gives us more of a reason to plan activities during lunchtime”, but having the walkie-talkies still enabled them to connect.

“I do think this was a reasonably clever way to work around the problems with the phone ban, and I am hoping if the school’s senior staff address this they won’t consider it as just a way to surpass their rules and be difficult.”

Phone ban explained

The cellphone ban started on the first day of Term 2, April 29, after the National Party campaigned on the policy throughout last year’s election.

National said banning cellphones in schools would help lift achievement rates.

“To turn around falling achievement, students need to focus on their schoolwork during their precious classroom time. That means doing what we can to eliminate unnecessary disturbances and distractions,” the party said.

“We want teachers to be able to get on with teaching and students to concentrate on learning. Student achievement has declined over the past three decades, jeopardising kids’ future livelihoods and threatening New Zealand’s future prosperity.”

Raphael Franks is an Auckland-based reporter who covers breaking news. He joined the Herald as a Te Rito cadet in 2022.