Senate education committee hears wide-ranging testimony on bill to limit student phone and social-media use

Montpelier — The Vermont Senate Education Committee on the floor of a public hearing considered a bill that would direct the Agency of Education (AOE) to create a statewide model policy limiting student use of personal electronic devices and schools’ use of social media during the academic day.

The measure drew detailed testimony from Oliver Olsen, a representative of the Vermont Independent Schools Association, and from Liza Earl Centers, a Montpelier resident and organizer with the Vermont Coalition for Phone and Social Media Free Schools, among others. Witnesses described survey results, operational concerns for boarding and specialty schools, and competing priorities around student safety, equity and school logistics.

The bill’s central mechanism would require AOE to develop a baseline, “floor” policy that districts and approved independent schools could adapt. Oliver Olsen said VISA surveyed its membership of roughly 42 schools and received about 30 responses — “about a 70% response rate” — and that every responding school “had some sort of policy in place.” He told the committee that many independent schools support a model policy rather than a prescriptive statute but asked that the model allow documented exceptions for students with disabilities, international students with equivalent plans, boarding-school routines and certain athletic or co‑curricular uses.

Olsen urged several specific statutory changes the association would like the committee to adopt before finalizing direction to AOE. He recommended that the statute require AOE to consult not only with the Vermont School Boards Association but also with the Vermont Independent Schools Association (VISA) and suggested replacing a reference to the technical standard “Bluetooth” with the broader term “wireless” so the law does not become obsolete. He also offered alternate statutory text for disability-related exceptions: “required to meet a student’s special education needs, health care needs, or as part of a disability accommodation, which shall be documented as part of the student’s applicable individualized health care plan, individualized education program, 504 plan, or similar formal documented plan.” Olsen said that wording would capture international students who have functional equivalents to IEP/504 plans in other countries.

Advocates from the Vermont Coalition for Phone and Social Media Free Schools urged a stricter approach. Liza Earl Centers said the coalition represents nearly 2,000 Vermonters and told the committee the coalition supports a “bell‑to‑bell” academic‑day restriction on personal devices and on social‑media use by schools, arguing the break from constant phone access improves students’ mental health and classroom engagement. “We want students a seven‑hour break,” Centers said, and urged the committee to keep the bill’s language strong and statewide to address equity concerns when local adoption is uneven.

Committee members focused much of the discussion on two technical but consequential issues: how the statute should define the covered time period (the draft used “arrival to dismissal” versus language such as “during the academic day”) and how to craft narrow exceptions so the policy does not inadvertently bar devices that support legitimate educational, health or safety functions. Senators and counsel repeatedly raised the boarding‑school example used by witnesses: a boarding student who leaves campus for off‑campus athletic training or a field trip may need device access for safety, attendance tracking, or to call home.

On social media, witnesses and legislators debated whether statute should attempt a broad definition (which can sweep in education tools) or instead prohibit certain uses while allowing schools to approve specific, nondisruptive platforms for communications (examples discussed included district systems such as ParentSquare and learning‑management systems). Committee members expressed concern about asking AOE to both draft a comprehensive statewide model policy and simultaneously be given broad discretion to override the statute’s prohibitions, noting separation‑of‑powers and workload considerations for an agency with limited staff.

By the end of the hearing the committee coalesced around several drafting directions rather than a final vote: add VISA and a named representative of the Vermont Coalition for Phone and Social Media Free Schools to the list of entities with which AOE must consult when developing the model policy; replace “Bluetooth” with “wireless”; clarify disability‑related exception language to encompass “similar formal documented plans” for students from other countries; and craft narrower, written administrator exceptions for specific academic, athletic or co‑curricular purposes. Committee members also agreed to give AOE discretion to develop implementation guidance but debated how prescriptive to make that authority in statute.

No formal committee vote was recorded during the hearing. Committee staff said they would produce a revised draft reflecting the suggested edits and that members anticipated further markup at the committee’s next meeting.

The committee’s next steps are a revised bill draft for review and a possible markup; the hearing record shows the committee intends to continue deliberations and to circulate amended language for members and stakeholders before any final vote.

The testimony combined policy, operational and equity arguments: independent‑school officials emphasized the variety of school types (boarding, therapeutic, ski academies and day schools) and asked for flexibility in the model policy, while parent and community advocates pushed for a statewide floor they said would reduce harms from social media and unequal local adoption. The committee faces drafting choices about statutory specificity, AOE authority and the scope of exceptions as it prepares a new draft for further consideration.