Let’s debate LA’s screen time policy

Also, the conversation Ross Wiener kicked off concludes, including with a response from Ross himself.

Hi, friends. I hope y’all had a great holiday weekend. I had a lot of fun, but neither my dog nor I was happy about the post-midnight fireworks in Washington, D.C.

Today we use LAUSD’s new screen time policy as a vehicle to debate what states and districts should do, if anything, about the use of devices in schools. Also: A special “America 250” edition of Extra Credit, featuring Matt Yglesias, Dan Buck, Aimee Guidera, Tim Daly, Stefanie Sanford, Bruno Manno, Checker Finn, and Rick Hess, among others. And we wrap up the debate on NCLB and accountability that Ross Wiener started, with additional thoughts from Bob Schwartz, Sara Allen, Kevin Huffman, Cheryl Oldham, and Ross himself.

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The growing, grassroots techlash was one of the big stories of the first half of 2026. Phone bans came first, and now broader device bans or screen time limits are on the table. LAUSD was the first large district out of the gate with a comprehensive screen time policy, revised and adopted by its school board in June and to be implemented in August, and it gives us something concrete to evaluate.

Kate Sequeira has a good summary:

• Los Angeles Unified will ban classroom screen time in preschool through first grade and sharply limit it for older students.

• The policy also blocks YouTube and social media sites during the school day.

• The policy was fueled in part by parent demands to halt the reliance of computers in the classroom.

Here are the grade-specific screen time limits (which include homework; time on devices for state and local assessments is exempt):

The policy also:

• Encourages schools to utilize laptop carts and/or computer labs for second through fifth grade, while reducing the use of one-to-one devices.

• Prohibits elementary and middle school student device use during passing periods, lunch, and recess with limited exceptions for teacher-approved school work.

• Establishes parental opt-in consent procedures for technology tools during the school day and at home on school-issued devices.

• Encourages the use of paper and pen assignments and physical textbooks.

• Ensures all district-approved curricula include sufficient physical texts for all students.

• Encourages off-screen homework assignments when homework is assigned, especially for elementary and middle school students.

• Requires the district to regularly track and report students’ time spent on school-issued devices, and requires that this information be made available to parents. The parental information provision also gives parents the right to see the apps and websites their child uses on school devices.

So should other districts follow L.A.’s lead? What about states?

In many respects, we’re back to where we were with the phone ban debate—one of the first topics we tackled here at SCHOOLED. We must consider both what smart practice looks like and separately figure out which level of government should be making the rules. (Or we could choose to do nothing—and risk further enflaming the parent backlash to technology in schools.)

Let’s start with the questions around instructional practice pertaining to devices:

• Are LAUSD’s screen time limits—very strict in the early grades and becoming somewhat looser as students get older—about right?

• Is it appropriate to ban YouTube and social media sites during the school day, as L.A. plans to do? Are there any risks or downsides to doing that?

• What about turning away from one-to-one computing toward using Chromebook carts or computer labs on an as-needed basis, at least for elementary students?

• Can we afford to go back to printed materials? Should we?

• Should tech-savvy teachers be allowed to break these rules or ask for exemptions from them? What about tech-focused schools?

• What consequences should there be for noncompliance?

• What about teachers’ instructional use of digital technology, such as the frequent use of slides or videos on Smartboards?

• What carve-outs are needed for students with disabilities? Any other student subgroups?

• What else should we be thinking about?

Next we can debate whether these policies should be set at the school, district, or state level.

On that point, I’m less enamored with state policy on screen time and devices than I am with phone bans. In my mind, phone bans are entirely defensible, with very little downside, but of course implementation is the challenge. As several of you argued back in the fall when we debated that topic, state phone bans can give schools and districts political cover to “do the right thing.”

I’m less sure, though, that we know what the “right thing” is with screen time limits and broader device bans. (Hence this debate!) I do worry that across-the-board bans and strict limits from on high—either from states or from large-district central offices—might get in the way of some instructionally helpful tech use. As Michael Horn argued recently, we can believe that kids are spending way too much time on screens, including at school, while also believing that there are at least a few tools and programs out there that actually add value to student learning (including for the youngest students). I worry, then, that LAUSD may have gone too far.

Still, as a parent, returning to physical books, paper-and-pencil assignments and exams, and screen-free lunch and recess warms the cockles of my heart.

What do YOU think? Please let me know by responding to this newsletter, emailing me at SCHOOLED@FordhamInstitute.org, or leaving a comment.

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David Bobb, “America at 250: Our Classrooms Are Too Quiet”

Daniel Buck, “Teaching Students to Love America Again”

Tim Daly, “The Declaration at 250: A Report Card”

Checker Finn, “Civics, citizenship, and America 250”

Aimee Guidera, “250 Reasons This Is the Time for a Renaissance in Civic Education”

Frederick Hess, “What Is a Democratic Education, Anyway?”

Bruno V. Manno, “‘Only in America’: Civic Memory at 250”

Joshua C. Robertson, “What, to the Black Student, is the Fourth of July?”

Stefanie Sanford, Michael J. Petrilli, and Amber M. Northern, “Beyond Fireworks: America 250 and Civic Renewal (Episode 1024 of The Education Gadfly Show)”

Matthew Yglesias, “They Should Teach Patriotism in Schools”

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Despite boasting one of the nation’s most powerful teachers unions, Massachusetts unanimously passed a sweeping literacy reform bill late last month, reflecting a commitment to evidence-based reading instruction. As Neetu Arnold notes, the new law “is vital not only for the promise it holds out for public school students but also because it shows how sensible education reform can win over teachers unions even in deep-blue states.”

Lily Altavena shares Nat Malkus’s latest analysis for AEI, with sobering findings on post-pandemic absenteeism: 22.6 percent of students were chronically absent in 44 states and D.C. in 2024–25, down only about a percentage point from the previous year. Lily rightly notes, “a decade ago, the federal government considered a significantly lower rate to constitute an emergency.” As Nat puts it, chronic absenteeism has become a chronic condition in America’s schools.

Alyson Klein shows how a school district outside Seattle is using AI to provide personalized feedback to its teachers. James Cantonwine, director of research and assessment for Peninsula school district, used Claude Code to develop the optional tool that provides support without the pressure that can come from a human instructional coach. I’ve been a fan of this sort of thing for years and am thrilled to see more schools experiment with it.

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In The Atlantic, David Brooks explains how different types of people will likely use AI—calling them Productive Passengers, Reluctant Optimizers, and Mental Marathoners. He also calls on schools to figure out how to turn more kids into Mental Marathoners who seek out rather than shirk complexity. “In our current culture,” he writes, “everybody tells you to find your passion, but nobody tells you how. Schools and organizations are going to have to teach that.”

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For the past two weeks, SCHOOLED has covered the debate kicked off by Ross Wiener’s New York Times op-ed on testing, accountability, and NCLB. Here are a few more comments, starting with those from Ross himself:

Mike, thanks for pulling this together and for the invitation to respond. Robert Pondiscio called it a draw, and I’ll take that. His framing that “the central flaw of the accountability era was mistaking measurement for a theory of improvement” suggests to me we don’t disagree as much as the debate suggests.

On the evidence: Critics imply that achievement stagnation and decline resulted from changes in federal accountability policy. But PISA data show declining scores across dozens of countries with entirely different accountability regimes over the same period. The causes of our current crisis run deeper.

Charlie Barone called my social contract framing “the cringiest part” of the piece. I didn’t attribute that to George Miller or any reformer. I was describing the implicit bargain between schools and students that the accountability framework assumed and depended on—and that has eroded, for reasons well beyond any single policy (although not unrelated to students experiencing school as boring and irrelevant). That’s the condition any renewed accountability push now has to contend with.

Reformers have recirculated arguments that accountability, including third-grade retention, is a linchpin of Mississippi’s reading gains. I admire those gains and don’t diminish them. But I have not seen reformers grapple seriously with more recent research from Texas showing that third-grade retention led to higher chronic absence, lower graduation rates, and 19 percent lower income at age 26. (Go ahead and argue it’s because Mississippi offered more comprehensive support, and then scratch your head about which side you’re on.) Our field does not have a healthy relationship with evidence—overstating it when it helps, ignoring it when it doesn’t—and the public feels it. It’s a significant reason education policy has lost credibility with the communities it is trying to serve.

Kevin Huffman sums it up well: Nobody is articulating a compelling vision for the future that channels what the public actually wants and needs from schools. That’s a conversation I want to help open up.

Speaking of Kevin, he’s got a few additional thoughts, too. On LinkedIn, he wrote:

In his Substack today, Mike Petrilli pulls together a synopsis of pushback commentary (including mine) on Ross Wiener’s NYT piece on No Child Left Behind nostalgia. The danger of all of us pushing back is that it reinforces the idea that a bunch of usual suspects are out there fervently pushing Reform 1.0, which I don’t think is true.

But looking across the commentary and the original piece, there are a few themes that are worth holding at once:

• Any honest look at the NCLB era has to acknowledge that reading and math scores, particularly for underperforming groups, rose significantly more than in the era before and the era after.

• It is a bit of a strawperson to suggest that people are pushing for a return to NCLB. Yeah, there is some nostalgia—but mainly in the context of a federal walk-back from accountability under end-stage Obama and Biden, and fully under Trump; and in watching too many states fail to use their newfound freedoms to ensure schools delivered strong teaching to high-need kids.

• Reform, whatever that means, has not stood still. In Tennessee, three commissioners have taken the baton since I left the SEA, and each focused on different core activities. Science of reading and literacy instruction, HQIM in math, high-dosage tutoring, funding formula overhaul, charter and choice expansion. And the state keeps moving up the rankings. If “reform” means doing things with a basis in evidence and halting things that don’t work, there are a lot of ways to approach that. It’s not like the reform-oriented chiefs after me were dusting off Tennessee’s Race to the Top application—and that’s good!

• Ross’s core point is still percolating in my head: We are in a different era and what students want and need is different. How do we push for, support, and measure things that are highly relevant for this generation? Because when kids are voting with their feet, something isn’t working. Yeah, it’s a bit of a false dichotomy as Mike notes: We can teach kids to read and do math and make classes relevant. But in my view, nobody—not the anti-accountability and anti-test crowd, and not the reform crowd—is succeeding in relevance at scale.

Sara Allen responded to Kevin and added some smart thoughts of her own:

Kevin Huffman, thanks for this reflection and for the ongoing systemic approach you continue to take to improving outcomes for students. I think we all should avoid talking and reflection about K–12 as a monolith. Student disengagement is largely a high school and middle school problem. The existing reform push on HQIM and teacher coaching that’s grounded in standards is still a really solid idea for K–6 (I’d argue a more intentional focus on developmentally appropriate practice is needed preK–2) along with thoughtful accountability focused on early intervention. But the basic model of elementary school is not broken. It’s high school that is the place where kids are checked out, purpose is in question, and the existing structure is not working. That’s where we really need a new design blueprint. And middle school needs some of both. Let’s be honest: NCLB was a grade 3–8 reform. High school never had test-based accountability. But what Ross Wiener is calling out around student disengagement is mostly a middle and high school problem. We need different models for different stages of child development. I hope we can move to that conversation.

I find Sara’s grade 3–8 versus high school point very compelling. And I’m more comfortable with Ross’s argument when it comes to the high school years, where the tradeoffs between traditional academics and other priorities are clearer. I can see that the Big Picture Company, for example, chooses to downplay traditional academics as a tradeoff to focus on other things, including work-based learning and career preparation. But in my experience, great elementary schools are great at the academic piece and the other stuff that Ross—and really all of us—also value.

Meanwhile, Cheryl Oldham got her letter to the editor published in the Times:

In his essay on the legacy of the No Child Left Behind policy, Mr. Wiener creates a false choice between academic achievement and everything else we want for students: purpose, character, and civic engagement. Framing the issue around nostalgia misses the point entirely. Wanting accountability is not a longing for the past but a recognition that when systems are held responsible for results, students benefit.

Reading and math are not competing with the outcomes Mr. Wiener rightly values, but rather foundational to them. The vision of schools that cultivate meaning, belonging, and civic commitment requires students who can actually read.

The data are damning. Eighth-grade reading scores are at their lowest level in more than 30 years. This is not an abstract metric. It is a signal that we are failing real children—most of them low-income students and students of color.

Accountability is about holding systems and adults responsible for results. Measurement is how we know whether we are making progress. I saw this when my son’s elementary school missed its reading goals in 2008. The community took it seriously, marshaled resources, and changed course.

We are not choosing between academic rigor and human flourishing. We are choosing whether to take seriously our obligation to deliver both.

Let’s finish with OG reformer Bob Schwartz:

Hi, Mike. Thanks for pulling together some of the more thoughtful responses to Ross Wiener’s op-ed. I’m not as willing as Ross seems to be to abandon test-based accountability, but I’m in general agreement with the thrust of his argument. I don’t know that any of us standardistas ever believed that test scores were by themselves an adequate measure of school performance, but NCLB as implemented did have the unintended consequence of crowding out any discussion of metrics other than math and reading scores. Its great contribution, however, was its focus on disaggregation of results and its redefinition of a good school as one in which all groups of students are making reasonable progress.

What’s missing from the discussion, in my view, is any acknowledgement that standards-based reform began a decade before NCLB, and that the greatest gains preceded the implementation of NCLB. As you know, I was the first president of Achieve, appointed in 1997 with a mandate from my board of governors and corporate CEOs to help states benchmark the quality of their standards and assessment systems. When we started, only 16 states had standards, assessments, and accountability systems in place. Thanks largely to the requirements of the Goals 2000 legislation, three years later Iowa was the only holdout.

During my five-and-a-half-year tenure at Achieve, 15 states, mostly initiated by governors, invited our benchmarking teams in to assess the quality of their standards, the quality of their assessments, and the alignment between the two. This benchmarking process not only helped states individually but promoted cross-state learning, as well. More relevant to this discussion was a project we initiated at the end of my tenure. We decided to take a close look at three high-reform states—Maryland, Massachusetts, and Texas—to try to understand their overall reform strategies. We assembled visiting committees of policy analysts and researchers who spent two or three days on the ground interviewing leaders at all levels of the system. On balance, we came away impressed by the thoughtfulness of the reform design in each case and the degree to which the designs fit their very different cultural and political contexts. Our big takeaway, reflected in the title of our report—Three Pathways, One Destination—was that there are many roads to standards-based reform and that the diversity of state strategies ought to be respected in federal policy.

I resigned from Achieve at the end of 2002, just after the release of the Three Pathways report. One of the reasons I resigned was my worry, as I wrote at the time, that standards-based reform “would be smothered in the warm embrace of NCLB.” I’m not sure now whether, on balance, NCLB was helpful or harmful to the standards movement. NCLB essentially tried to impose the Texas strategy on the whole country. It provided a useful roadmap for some of the lower performing states but it may have inhibited the development of other states. If we’d had a federal policy that was more nuanced, perhaps states like Maryland and Massachusetts would have moved beyond the standards paradigm to develop the kind of aligned curriculum/instruction/professional development systems that policy analysts like David Cohen and Richard Elmore were advocating for then, and that Robert Pondiscio is calling for now. Perhaps, also, we might have avoided the backlash that ensued in states like New York and Massachusetts from overinvesting in a mandated annual testing regime and underinvesting in the arts and the kinds of experiential learning opportunities Ross is calling for to engage students and begin to address issues of purpose and belonging.

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Great stuff, everyone! See you next week.

Mike

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