Kansas Governor Laura Kelly signed into law KS House Bill No. 2299, officially banning “personal electronic devices” from schools on March 19. The law, which will come into effect on July 1, will prohibit students from bringing devices that provide voice, text, or video communication between two or more parties to school.
The law requires that all personal electronic devices be turned off and placed in a location that is completely inaccessible to students during the school day. Despite the intentions of the lawmakers in Topeka, School districts are concerned about the difficulties in gathering all student devices in a school, and more concerns are arising over how the schools will handle the redistribution of those devices at the end of the day.
“We are still evaluating the language within the new law,” Shawnee Mission School District Superintendent Michael Schumaker said. “The things that are really hanging us up are a secure location, there’s specific language around that, and then ‘inaccessible,’ so those two words we view as really restrictive on what we can do to meet the law.”
According to Schumacher, there hasn’t yet been very clear guidance on implementing the law and clarifying its text by the Attorney General. One way that schools have been thinking of containing personal electronic devices is through Yondr pouches. These patches lock phones inside them until the patch is unlocked by being tapped against an “unlocking base”—an object that acts as a key for the pouches. These pouches cost $25 to $30 per pouch, which, combined with the 26,297 students enrolled at the start of 2025, poses major costs for the district alongside others that have been stirred up by the law.
“The Yondr pouches, or another brand, they’re very expensive,” Schumacher said. “You know, there are some cheaper versions, but it would come at a cost to the district. I think a million dollars is probably on the super low end. High-end, probably, over 2 million to do it for the entire district.”
Along with the costs the district faces, there is public frustration with the new law, expressed by Schumacher and others. SMSD and SM South’s policy on the issue of cell phones in schools has allowed students to have their phones with them and to pursue education in the same environment, with Schumacher stating that there has been an 80% success rate in keeping phones out of the picture during instructional time. However, as the law now requires the separation of the two, schools are left with the difficulties of managing the student body.
“Obviously, I think our students and staff have done a great job in navigating cell phone use here in our building, our students are engaged and attentive during class, and I’m real proud of how our students and staff have navigated cell phones in the past year or two,” principal Todd Dain said. “It’s frustrating on our part, because at a 6A high school, it’s really difficult to imagine how we would navigate cell phones, collecting cell phones, distributing cell phones, storing cell phones. I mean, 1600 cell phones, it’s impossible for us to store and distribute and collect and do all those things that I think the intent of the bill had.”
For the district to implement the law, there are concerns with how time will be managed in gathering and redistributing the devices daily, and the possibility of hiring new staff members specifically to do this is not out of the question. South has over 1600 students, and managing all of those students’ devices effectively poses a real challenge.
“When Senator Corson was here, I said ‘we just don’t have the manpower or the resources or the facilities to collect, store, and distribute cell phones,’” Dain said. “It would require an additional two staff members here that we would have to hire just to navigate cell phones here in our building.”
Gathering and redistributing the devices is a major challenge that will likely impact instructional time and the staff themselves. According to Schumacher, SMSD has yet to come up with the new policies surrounding the law, its implementation, and the potential punishments for those who don’t comply, bringing the readiness of the staff into question.
“I don’t know, if you were to press me, I would say [they’re] probably not [ready],” Schumacher said. “And that’s where we step in as district leaders, where we need to set our staff up for success, where we’re not, you know, implementing a policy that’s going to be a burden to them or be an impossibility for them, to ask our kids to comply within the intent of the law, for the proponents of it is to make it easier for staff. I’m not convinced that it does make it easier for staff, but that’s what they state is their intent.”
Alongside the effects of the bill on individuals, there are challenges ahead for larger groups. Classes and organizations around the district have used phones and social media as aids in advertising clubs, events, and organizations, as well as–in the case of the Patriot and Heritage–reporting on said clubs, events, and organizations. The ban would force these groups to move to different methods of performing these tasks.
“It’s going to be a significant impact, because students cannot have those devices on campus,” Dain said. “So that means that those classes are going to have to use different devices for all of those purposes, whether it be an iPad, whether it be a mini camera, whether it be another device, the school is going to have to foot the bill to to procure those devices to make sure that students have the ability to record and do all those things.”
