When I began reading Sara McAdory’s Feb. 8 article about cell phone use, I could not help but think of Walter Diehl’s extreme consequences for violating his cell phone usage policy.
Based on experiences in his zoology class this semester, I was not surprised that he is spearheading a movement to ban cell phone use in classrooms.
His personal classroom policy differs from the usage ban he proposed in McAdory’s article, and I would not be surprised if he eventually calls for the complete banishment of cell phones.
Perhaps the worst part of all is that Diehl’s punishment for cell phone use is humiliating to the guilty student and more distracting than the cell phone itself.
Concerning his BIO 1504 Zoology syllabus, not only is use prohibited, but cell phones are not even allowed to be visible without reaping drastic consequences, such as dismissal from class.
In his class, having a cell phone is just as illegal as possessing drugs. Do not let them be seen.
What is the difference between cell phone prohibition and Diehl’s classroom version of cell phone use prohibition?
Concerning the latter, it is not a crime to keep a cell phone turned off and hidden away.
Diehl cannot enforce the prohibition of cell phones because he does not have the right to search students.
However, Diehl does have the right as an instructor to make up and enforce any classroom rule, within reason, that he wants.
He also has the right to propose a campuswide cell phone use policy that differs from what he enforces in his classroom. But why would he do this? It is plausible that he will eventually propose the prohibition of cell phones.
What is the main purpose of restricting cell phone usage? The overarching principle is to keep them from being a distraction.
Diehl’s punishment violates the principle more than the violation itself. For example, a cell phone beeped one time in zoology on Wednesday morning (probably a text message) while Diehl was writing on the dry erase board.
When Diehl stopped class and asked who did it, no one responded. He then threatened to make everyone in class teach themselves the current material.
Finally, after a few more minutes, the guilty and extremely embarrassed student got up and left class.
Diehl wasted five minutes and completely derailed everyone’s concentration to enforce a rule.
In all of my other classes, even from my three previous semesters, the instructors have completely ignored similar cell phone disruptions because they know that saying something causes a greater interruption.
A few weeks ago, after class had been dismissed, he shouted, “You, with the cell phone, don’t come back to class.” Someone apparently started dialing while they were walking out of class.
Diehl was only enforcing the rule from the syllabus. It states that “use … is prohibited in the classroom ‘door to door.'”
Diehl definitely has the authority to do what he did. But was the student disrupting class any more than the others talking to each other as they left the room? Again, the rule was put in front of the principle.
What Diehl and other teachers should do is cut out blatant disrespect.
If a student answers a phone, starts or responds to a text message or allows a phone to ring multiples times, then a punishment is deserved for the interruption of class.
But if a harmless beep or a single ring sounds, then it really is not that big of a deal.
Matt O’Brien is a junior chemical engineering major.