Kollam: Children’s mobile phone usage in schools continues to pose a challenge for teachers in Kerala, with many students filming Reels and engaging in other activities on school premises during breaks.

The General Education Department has directed that any mobile phones found in schools must be confiscated by the headmaster and kept until 31 March, with the incident reported to the District Deputy Education Officer (DDE). Phones will only be returned once the academic year concludes.

Schools have also been instructed to establish an Ethics Committee, chaired by the PTA President, with the Mother PTA President as Vice-Chair and the headmaster as Convenor. However, such committees remain rare.

Teachers strictly advise students not to bring mobile phones to school, and parents are regularly reminded of this rule. Despite this, it has become common for students to store phones in shops on or near school premises by paying a fixed fee. Some even bring phones into classrooms hidden inside their clothes.

Students frequently use school surroundings to film Reels during lunch breaks and other intervals. Teacher organisations note that the situation is particularly severe in schools without permanent staff. In many cases, students even issue threats to teachers who try to enforce the ban on mobile phones.

While higher secondary schools currently have an academic monitoring system in place, district-level teams assessing schools focus on academic standards and infrastructure, without addressing the misuse of mobile phones—a practice that can negatively affect children’s mental development and academic performance.