Aysaa Palacios Stories

According to the Pew Internet & American Life survey, 73 percent of teenagers text message on a regular basis.
Science Academy students have become accustomed to text messaging in and out of class, and students are having their phones taken away for texting in class.
“Last year, Ms. [Sandi] Sanborn saw me texting [and] told me to take it to Mr. Garcia,” Katherine Cantu, 11, said.
Each student finds a different way to hide their texting in class.
“I usually place my purse in front of me and hide it behind there,” Yaneisy Eng, 11, said.
This method doesn’t work for guys. They use an alternative for texting in class.
“I place my phone under my desk to hide the fact that I text,” Aldo Lopez, 11, said. “I don’t want for it to look obvious.”
But are the students to blame?
“I get bored sometimes during teachers’ lectures,” Cantu said. “I can’t think of anything else to do that doesn’t involve disrupting the class.”
Should teachers do something about all this texting occurring in class, or should they just let it go by?
“I tell my students to put their phones away,” biology teacher Esteban Villarreal said. “But I never take it away.”
However, students sometimes don’t listen to teachers who tell them to put phones away.
“It all depends on who the teacher is and how mad they get when they see me texting,” Eng said.
There are some teachers whose phones ring in class, yet students aren’t allowed to have phones out in their classes.
“There’s always a teacher who calls her husband during class,” Mahima Bazaz, 12, said. “And/or her phone rings during class.”
Bazaz finds the fact that teachers can have their phones on during class hypocritical.
“But yet we were never allowed to have our phones out without having them taken away.”