The Port Arthur ISD superintendent asked the board to consider two related policy changes during the meeting: opting out of allowing private charter school students to take part in ISD extracurricular activities and adopting a possession-and-usage ban on cellphones, smartwatches and tablets during the instructional day.

“...we are asking for several policies to be approved. The first policy is to opt out of private charter school students that are enrolled in private charter school coming to our school for extracurricular,” Superintendent Dr. Porterby said. He added that the opt-out is connected to a change enacted by the state in the prior legislative session.

On electronic devices, Dr. Porterby referred to state action and said the district is requesting a local policy on both possession and usage in classrooms: “The state has allowed us to ask for you to approve a policy of possession as well as usage. Possession means that a student would not be able to bring a cell phone, a smartwatch, or tablet to school along with the usage.”

Dr. Porterby said the district will work with parents when implementing the rule and described a one-year trial: “So we're going to do that for one year, and we're going to see how it works out. We're gonna work with our parents. We will call them. We will remind them. We're gonna remind our students.” The transcript indicates the district has been notifying families since early July.

A board member who identified themself as a member of Generation Z praised the possession approach as a compromise, saying the policy allows students to retain devices but not use them during school. That trustee urged parents to prepare students for the rule.

The transcript cites House Bill 1481 in connection with device rules and references the prior legislative session for the charter extracurricular entitlement; those were presented as legal context by the superintendent, but the transcript does not record a final board vote on these policies. The consent agenda and other routine items were approved later in the meeting, but the record here does not show a discrete, recorded vote adopting the device or charter opt-out policies.

Because the transcript contains inconsistent references to dates (speakers referenced both Aug. 12 and Aug. 13 in relation to the start of school), the effective start date of any adopted device policy is not specified in the supplied transcript and should be confirmed in the official agenda or minutes.