With more than 23,000 signatures, the petition “LIVING in the schoolyard, without smartphone screens!”, launched in May 2023, had already been discussed in the parliamentary committee on Science Education, but reached the plenary today, accompanied by two projects of law, from BE and PAN, and draft resolutions from PCP, CDS-PP, Livre and PAN on the topic.

“The student status must be reviewed, because there is no paragraph that addresses the issue of use in the playground and this space must be considered”, highlights Mónica Pereira, in statements to Lusa agency.

Currently, the Student Statute and School Ethics prohibits the use of cell phones only in classrooms, but the petitioners want to see this rule also extended to recreation areas and up to the 9th grade.

In September, the Ministry of Education, Science and Innovation (MECI) recommended that schools ban the use of cell phones in the 1st and 2nd cycles and restrictions in the 3rd cycle, measures of voluntary adherence that will be evaluated throughout the school year.

Since the beginning of the school year, 35 out of 128 schools interviewed by the National Education Federation have adopted procedures that limit or prohibit the use of cell phones, but Mónica Pereira adds that the number of schools that have chosen to ban it completely is less than 20.

“From the school groups that have already made this change, we have received a lot of information that the measures have been well received and are being successful”, reported the author of the petition, who is part of the Menos Telas, Mais Vida Movement, created in the meantime.

Taking into account the experience of these schools and the experience of other countries that have followed the path of prohibition, Mónica Pereira sees no reason to wait another year to see if the measure is effective.

“It doesn’t make sense – since we have several scientific data that indicate that the harms of excessive use of screens are much greater than the benefits – that the decision should continue to be left in the hands of each school”, she explains.

In addition to the petition, the BE bill proposes changing the student statute to include the extension of the ban on cell phone use “to non-teaching times, in the case of 1st and 2nd cycle students”, while the PAN proposes the possibility for schools to create “areas free of technological equipment” and the creation of a “plan for good coexistence in the educational community” that includes the “healthy use” of this equipment.