Every Pennsylvania School Must Ban Student Cellphones From Bell to Bell, Including Lunch, Under a Law Gov. Josh Shapiro Signed Oct. 26

Pennsylvania students will spend the whole school day without their personal phones starting next school year. Gov. Josh Shapiro signed Senate Bill 1014 on Oct. 26 at Lenape Middle School in Doylestown, and the new law requires every public, charter, cyber charter and private school in the state to adopt a “bell-to-bell” policy that keeps students off their phones from the first bell to dismissal, including lunch, recess and the walk between classes.

For families, the change means a new set of rules about how to reach a child during the day, and a school year, 2027-28, by which those rules have to be in place.

Act 117 covers lunch, recess and the hallways

The governor’s office said the law applies to school districts, intermediate units, career and technical schools, charter and regional charter schools, cyber charter schools, and private, approved private and nonpublic schools. Each must adopt a policy that prohibits students from using personal cell phones during the school day, and that includes non-instructional time such as lunch, recess and passing periods.

The measure is now Act 117 of 2026, according to the Pennsylvania General Assembly’s bill record. That record shows the bill’s long road: the Senate first passed it 46-1 in February, the House amended it and passed it 141-62 on Oct. 19, the Senate agreed to the House changes 47-3 on Oct. 21, and the governor approved it on Oct. 26.

The law does not tell schools exactly how to do it. The governor’s office said schools are not required to physically take students’ phones, and each school must spell out in its own policy how use will be restricted on school property.

What schools must tell parents

The part of the law parents will notice first is communication. Under the new requirements, schools must notify families about emergency communication procedures, give the public a chance to weigh in on the policy, and post the policy online.

That matters for parents who have grown used to texting a child about a change in pickup plans or a dentist appointment. Once a school’s policy is in effect, those messages will generally go through the front office or whatever channel the school sets up.

Rep. Mandy Steele, who sponsored the House version of the bill, said in a House Democratic news release after the final Senate vote that she pushed the measure for one basic reason: children need it. Her release also noted that phones under the plan would be stored so students cannot reach them until dismissal.

The exceptions written into the law

The ban is not absolute. The governor’s office listed exceptions for documented medical needs, special education or disability accommodations, devices used for English language learning, and other limited instructional purposes approved in advance.

When the Senate first passed the bill in February, the Senate Republican caucus spelled out those exceptions in more detail: students with certain medical conditions, students whose individualized education plans call for a personal communication device, English learners who use phones to translate, limited teacher use of phones as instructional tools with a principal’s approval, and single-day special occasions such as field days or science fairs.

The same release quoted the bill’s prime sponsor, Sen. Devlin Robinson, a Republican who represents the 37th District. Robinson said classrooms should be places for learning, “not constant notifications.” Sen. Vincent Hughes, a Democrat who co-sponsored the bill, said lawmakers wanted students “focused on learning and socializing, not glued to their screens.”

Why state officials pushed for it

At the signing, Shapiro framed the law as a response to what parents and teachers had been telling him. “Technology is a powerful tool, but it’s also a powerful distraction,” he said, according to his office.

The governor’s office pointed to the 2025 Pennsylvania Youth Survey, which asks students in grades 6, 8, 10 and 12 about their lives and added six questions on devices and social media. That survey found 24% of students spend four or more hours on social media per school day, and 36.3% spend four or more hours on non-school screen time.

Pennsylvania’s Secretary of Education, Dr. Carrie Rowe, said the law “gives schools a clear framework for reducing those distractions while trusting school leaders to make decisions that reflect their local context.” Christie Besack, a social studies teacher at Central Bucks High School West, said students who put their phones away are “more present” and “more engaged.”

Pennsylvania is far from alone. The governor’s office said the state joins more than two dozen others with similar bell-to-bell policies. The debate has been running in households for years, from parents clashing over phone rules in class to research tying nightly phone use to later bedtimes for teens, and a national poll found most Americans want limits on social media for kids under 16.

What changes in Philadelphia and other districts

Some Pennsylvania schools already limit phones, but the rules have varied from building to building. In Philadelphia, Chalkbeat Philadelphia reported that some principals had already adopted their own bans while others allowed phones at lunch and for some class assignments. The state law ends that flexibility, and the Philadelphia Board of Education said it would work with principals, educators, students and families on a districtwide policy.

Chalkbeat also reported that the law comes with no new money for schools to carry it out, leaving decisions about storage and enforcement to each district.

For parents, the next steps are practical ones. Each school’s draft policy must be posted online, and the law requires schools to give the public a chance to weigh in. Families will want to know how the school will reach them in an emergency and how a child can reach home if plans change. Parents of children with a medical need, an IEP or a 504 plan that depends on a phone have reason to raise it early, because those exceptions have to be documented.

The deadline is the start of the 2027-28 school year, which gives schools and families the rest of this school year and the summer to prepare.

Get stories like this by email. Sign up for The Parent Diaries Letter.

This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.

Image: Kumar Appaiah – CC BY-SA 2.0/Wikimedia Commons