When U-46 middle school students head back to class in August, the cellphones and smart watches they bring with them will be placed in pouches and kept out of reach during school hours.

On Monday, the District U-46 School Board is set to award a $172,750 contract to Yondr Inc. to purchase 6,625 pouches and 120 magnetic bases to lock and unlock them.

It’s just one of the measures U-46 will have in place in advance of pending legislation that would require school districts across Illinois to create policies controlling the use of wireless communication devices.

The phone pouches will be a tool to help ensure adherence to already established middle school guidelines that require students to put away their phones during the school day, said Mark Gonnella, U-46’s coordinator of culture.

“The pouches lock with a simple click. In order to unlock them you need the base offered by the company,” Gonnella said. “We have opted to have staff members hold them so that we are also able to greet the students at the beginning and the end of the day.”

If parents and students need to contact each other during the school day, calls will be made through landline office phones.

“In fact, that is the current expectation for communicating with all students in order to avoid disruptions to the learning environment,” Gonnella said.

During the recently completed school year, the district conducted a pilot program in which the pouches were used at Larsen Middle School in Elgin.

“The pouches proved successful as evidenced by reduced referrals and behavioral incidents overall as well as increased student engagement with one another and teachers and improved social-emotional well-being, to name a few,” Gonnella said.

Larsen principal Marc Spacone purchased board and card games for students to play on their lunch breaks, when they might otherwise be on their phones, and reported the students enjoyed them, he said.

The district also ran a pilot program at Streamwood High School in which cellphone use was prohibited in academic and instructional spaces and a system put in place to address infractions “using tiered discipline consistently at the site,” Gonnella said.

“For instance, the first time a Streamwood High School student had a cellphone out in a class, the teacher reminded them of the expectation that it should be put away,” he said. “If the device was out again, the student had to put the phone in a bag for the rest of the period, and they collected it at the end of the period.”

Gonnella said the consequences would escalate from there. If an administrator took the device for the rest of the school day, a family member had to come to the school to retrieve the device and discuss the incident with an administrator, he said.

William Johnson, U-46’s high school executive director, said the Streamwood High School conducted quarterly focus groups with students and staff regarding the pilot guidelines.

“Both groups believe that the change has positively impacted the learning environment,” Johnson said.

The test programs helped shape proposed code of conduct updates for all grade levels that the school board will consider approving Monday.

The guidelines note that “students who require the use of cellphones and/or other electronic devices due to compliance with the IEP/504 plan or a medical condition will be exempt from this regulation. Additionally, individual school sites may determine if cellphone use is essential for a specific learning experience, project or activity and adjust the guidelines accordingly for that specific instance.”

The proposed updated code of conduct can be viewed at go.boarddocs.com.