The executive order follows the failure to pass a similar bill during the 2025 Legislative Session and will help student mental health and learning, Kotek said.

By Alex Baumhardt, Oregon Capital Chronicle

By the middle of the upcoming school year, Oregon students will not be allowed to use their cellphones in school.

Gov. Tina Kotek on Wednesday issued an executive order to Oregon’s 197 school districts, requiring they adopt a policy for banning student cellphone use by Oct. 31, 2025. Those policies must be fully implemented by Jan. 1, 2026, the order reads.

The move follows the Legislature’s failure to pass a similar, bipartisan bill — House Bill 2251 — during the recent legislative session.

That bill would have, with some exceptions, required districts to ban cellphones for all grades, and enforce penalties on students who violate cellphone policies. But it failed to clear a key Senate committee vote. It faced opposition from powerful school board and school administrator groups, which expressed concerns about the state mandating policies that they felt school districts themselves should handle. Some school district leaders testified that enforcing the ban would be prohibitively expensive for them to do.

But State Rep. Lisa Reynolds, D-Beaverton, a doctor and chief sponsor of the bill that failed to pass, said in a news release that she was glad Kotek stepped in.

“By getting cellphones out of our schools, Governor Kotek is putting students first,” she said. “Every Oregon student deserves a distraction-free, harassment-free learning environment that fosters curiosity and community.”

The order technically bans all “personal electronic devices,” which includes any portable, electrically powered device capable of making and receiving calls and text messages, and that can access the internet independently from the school’s wireless network, such as a smart watch. It does not include laptops or other devices that support classroom activities.

In November, the Oregon Department of Education issued guidance to districts on limiting or ending cellphone use in schools. State law currently requires every school district to have policies about cellphones and personal electronic devices, but each district gets to set its own rules.

At least eight Oregon school districts have already either banned use in individual classes or in schools altogether, according to the state education department. Full bans have been enacted at some middle and high schools in the Lincoln County School District, Portland Public Schools, and in the Nyssa School District. The Lake Oswego School District bans cellphones for students in all K-12 schools.

Kotek in a news release said that model policies for schools that already have prohibitions in place will be made available, and the state will offer some flexibility in implementation.

“The research is clear,” Kotek said, “cellphone use can create a trifecta of consequences for our young people – mental health issues, safety in school, and distraction from learning.”

A growing body of research and teacher surveys show student cellphone use in schools is hindering more than helping the school experience.

In a May 2023 advisory, then-U.S. Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy recommended parents set limits on phone use, and in June 2024, Murthy called for health warnings on social media platforms for younger users, who research shows are suffering from higher rates of mental health issues when spending hours on the platforms each day.

A Pew Research Center survey from October 2023 found that more than two-thirds of U.S. adults favor banning cellphones during class, and almost two-thirds of high school teachers said cellphones have become a major distraction and impediment to learning.

The order makes Oregon one of at least 19 states that have adopted statewide cellphone bans in schools.

Alex Baumhardt has been a national radio producer focusing on education for American Public Media since 2017. She has reported from the Arctic to the Antarctic for national and international media, and from Minnesota and Oregon for The Washington Post.