DALTON, Mass. — The Central Berkshire Regional School Committee is still mulling over introducing Yondr pouches to its middle and high schools.

 

The goal of the policy change is to help students be more engaged in school and to prevent students from taking videos of their peers without permission and spreading them around, the school committee said during its June meeting. 

 

School Committee Chair Richard Peters said at last week's meeting that although it is likely that the committee will be in favor, a vote was not on the agenda and the matter was postponed to the next meeting. 

 

This program would require training that would take up to four weeks, Superintendent Leslie Blake-Davis said. 

 

The district will still apply for the state grant that would aid in covering the cost of this initiative in case the committee votes to support it. 

 

The hope is that this change would be budget neutral. The district may not know if they have been approved for the grant by the next meeting, Blake-Davis said.  

 

Yondr works with approximately 1,200 schools across the country and has a "huge" presence in Massachusetts, Yondr representative Matt Army said. 

 

The organization works with approximately 45 schools across the state including Boston Public Schools, Springfield, Greenfield, Chicopee, McCann Technical School in North Adams, and many more. 

 

The first school that implemented Yondr pouches reported an increase in attendance by 4 percent. 

 

"That's odd right, but it makes very sense and it's a very middle school answer. The kids at home couldn't text the kids at school. They got bored and decided to start coming to school more," Army said. 

 

The implementation has had a profound impact on students, Army said. They are able to take all the attention that goes into the phones and focus it on books. 

 

Yondr pouches were originally created for adults, which is why every teacher and admin will receive one of the Velcro pouches, Army said. 

 

"We the adults created this technology, gave it to students and didn't have any rules or regulations. We just said don't look up anything inappropriate," Army said. "It's time to re-evaluate that."

 

Yondr does an annual evaluation and out of the 900 school partners, it was determined there were improvements in academic performance, student behavior and student engagement, Army said. 

 

"Anecdotally, I'll say, day one, the students are going to learn how to make eye contact with each other," 

 

"...number two is conflict resolution. Students can't just go in the bathroom and message each other all day long perpetuating these, kind of, very small dramas that can get pretty serious. You know, if you have a problem with somebody you have to actually have a conversation."  

 

As a result, since school is a better place to be at becoming more "calm and nurturing" Army said. 

 

The organization installs mountable bases at the school's entrance that the students use to lock their electronic devices at the beginning of the day and open at the end. 

 

The pouch can fit multiple devices from multiple phones, Airpods, and an Apple Watch. The pouch is then placed in the student's backpack. 

 

Yondr has found that the dismissal process is faster than non-yondr schools because students have to go to the exit in order to open their phones and they want their phones pretty bad, Army said. 

 

Included in the program is a building walkthrough to figure out the logistics, a policy consultation, a presentation to the community, and two days of in-school support if needed, Army said. 

 

The pouches would cost $19 per student and $15 per teacher plus a one-time shipping fee. All of the equipment is included in that price. Pouch replacements are part of the program cost. 

 

The district has approximately 900 middle and high school students, Blake-Davis said. 

 

The organization tries to give its school partners one invoice per year so that they are not sending out multiple invoices for replacements. 

 

"That's just so cumbersome for everybody. So we try our best to make an all inclusive program," Army said. 

 

Every year the district will collect the pouches from the students and catalog how many would need to be replaced. Once the inventory is complete Yondr will send a return label so the district can return the pouch using the box it came in. 

 

Day one of the program implementation is distribution and introduction day. Students are assigned a pouch and help the students at the beginning and end of the day, Army said. 

 

"The middle of the day, that's where they get to have their first phone free experience and for some students, it's easy for others it's not so much but that's all part of the process," Army said. 

 

"And that's why we really have the Velcro patches for the adults, to model that behavior and make the acknowledgement that this is a pretty tough change to go through," Army said. 

 

Day two is the pouch check day because it is likely that some students are going to try and mess with the pouch. 

 

If there are any dents or marks that show students are trying to get into the locked pouch the phone will be taken away following a check-in conversation with the student.

 

"But, moral of the story is if you break your pouch we're going to hold the phone for the day. If it happens again, we're going to hold it till the parent or guardian can pick it up," Army said. 

 

The magnet Yondr uses to lock the pouches is specially designed to not wipe the phones. The organization has seen instances where students will try to get into their pouches using a magnet to unlock it but since it is not the specially designed magnet it can wipe the student's phones.