Mobile phones in school? As if!
Sheffield High ca. 1996
Carrie is leaning on her locker between classes when her friend, Britney, suddenly runs up to her.
Britney: Omigod, Carrie! Did you hear? Taylor totally got busted for carrying one of these to school.
Carrie: Yeah, if I had one of those I’d expect to be busted. Everyone knows only drug dealers use them. Duh!
Britney (shrugs): I don’t know. They’re kinda cool. He was showing us how he could make it ring and like, totally get himself out of class by saying it was his mom or something.
Carrie: Did his teacher actually fall for it?
Britney (giggles): No. He said it worked in Math class, but when he tried it in Socials, Mr. Pollock pulled out the same phone and made Taylor go to Ms. Kettleman’s office.
Carrie: Why does he even have one of those things anyways? Is he, you know, (lowers her voice and looks down the hallway) into stuff?
Britney (looks confused for a minute): Oh! No. He said that his parents bought it and are paying for the calls because he drives to work at night and they are worried about him.
Carrie: Well he'll be lucky to get it back now. Kettleman has a cupboard full of them. Danny Ng had his taken away last week and Stephanie's parents had to be called in for a meeting because her phone is always glued to her skull.
Britney: Yeah, but Stephanie only has one because she thinks it makes her look like Alicia Silverstone.
Britney and Carrie (laughing): As if!
Mobile phone technology really took off in the mid-late 90s. Thanks to companies like Motorola, Nokia (click to read about when "dumb" phones were cool) and a few other innovators people were starting to go wireless. However this technology was seen as suspicious in schools. The early mobile phone could make and receive phone calls. There was no connection to the Internet, taking pictures, or any of the smartphone features that we see today. Many educators did not see the value of students having a wireless phone, particularly since many classrooms already had a telephone, so in a lot of schools they were banned.
Photos used under Creative Commons from order_242, mayeesherr., Digital Game Museum, wwarby, RobotSkirts