Virginia will soon establish guidance to restrict or eliminate student cell phone use during instructional time at school.

On Tuesday, Gov. Glenn Youngkin issued Executive Order 33, which directs his administration to “heed the call” of parents, public health professionals, educators and others by establishing cell phone-free policies and procedures for school divisions, in light of growing concerns over children’s health and declines in academic performance.

The Virginia Department of Education, in collaboration with the Departments of Health and Health and Human Services, must clearly define what “cell phone-free education” means, and publish model plans and draft guidance on implementing in Virginia’s K-12 schools on its website by Aug. 15, according to the governor’s directive.

The directive will establish “the clear goal to protect the health and safety of our students by limiting the amount of time they are exposed to “addictive” cell phones and social media and eliminating “clear distractions” in the classroom, Youngkin said in a statement.

The governor added that $500,000 in existing funds allocated to the Departments of Education and Behavioral Health and Development Services will be made available to implement the initiative.

According to the governor’s office, the funds will support state and local efforts to facilitate family nights and community engagement events to combat youth mental health challenges, and provide microgrants for school divisions to help implement cell phone best practices in their communities.

As part of the policies’ development, the departments will be required to hold listening sessions seeking public input on “age-appropriate cell phone-free education policies and procedures, gather feedback on best practices currently underway in Virginia public schools, and receive input for the draft guidance,” the governor’s executive order reads.

The departments are slated to release the final guidance by Sept. 16 of this year. The order directs school boards to adopt the policies by Jan. 1, 2025, or before.

Youngkin’s order cites American Psychological Association that suggests adolescents who spend over three hours on social media daily have double the risk of poor mental health. The order also references studies showing that children spend about 4.8 hours a day on social media, and that students who use their phones during class learn less and earn lower grades.

“Therefore, creating a cell phone-free education environment in public schools is not only a prudent measure but an essential one to promote a healthier and more focused educational environment where every child is free to learn,” Youngkin directive states.

Some of Virginia’s school boards have already begun banning or restricting cell phone use in schools. empowering local boards to institute such prohibitions on cellphones and other “handheld communication devices” during regular school hours died last session.

James Fedderman, president of the Virginia Education Association, said in a statement that the organization recognizes the mounting worries over how cell phones impact students in classrooms and thinks it’s “essential” to approach the issue with “a nuanced perspective that considers the real-world needs of our students and teachers.”

Fedderman, whose organization is the largest educator advocacy group in the state, went on to urge the Virginia Department of Education to engage with educators to develop balanced guidelines “that support effective teaching and learning while also addressing legitimate concerns about distractions.”

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In Virginia, state education officials could be partly to blame.

The federal government whether the Virginia Department of Education misled school districts about their responsibility to serve students with disabilities during school closures. The probe focuses on whether the department allowed districts to deliver services that “fell short” of the free and appropriate education required under federal law. 

At the time, former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos districts still had to serve students with disabilities despite the shutdown. But Virginia’s  during that period said officials should “acknowledge service delivery limitations” and then make “reasonable efforts” to follow a student’s special education plan — known as an individualized education program —once schools reopened.

Districts across the state released documents saying that some services would be “functionally unavailable” because students were learning remotely and that educators would do their best to serve students online and by phone. 

The state education department “provided cover to the school systems for whatever type of … remote learning or virtual instruction” they provided, alleged Reade Bush, an Arlington, Virginia, father and part of the coalition of parents that asked the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights to investigate. “There was no attempt to make it compliant for students who could not engage in virtual learning.”

Virginia is the third state OCR has investigated for its handling of special education services during the pandemic. OCR dropped its investigation in Indiana in June, 2021, saying that it had no evidence the state was denying services to children with disabilities. Another investigation is ongoing.

The Department of Education all states last month of their responsibility to ensure districts follow the law and suggested that some need to tighten supervision. Twenty-two states and the District of Columbia have of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act for at least two years, and six states, including Virginia, didn’t meet expectations this year, according to the department.

Advocates welcomed the department’s guidance. Denise Marshall, CEO of the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates, a nonprofit focusing on students with disabilities, said monitoring “has been sorely lacking at all levels,” but added that even when states make improvements, federal officials should take “meaningful action” when needed. 

‘The system is just horrible’

The federal inquiry in Virginia is the latest challenge facing the state for its oversight of services for students with disabilities. Fairfax County parents and the state agency last fall, stating that “school-friendly” hearing officers who review parents’ complaints overwhelmingly rule against families. A federal district court last month, but the plaintiffs plan to appeal to the U.S Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

The state’s failure to hold districts accountable is a long-standing problem that , according to special education advocates. Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who made parent empowerment a centerpiece of his campaign, has special education, but some state board members remain frustrated.

“The system is just horrible in every which way … anti-family, pro-lawyer, pro-litigation,” Board Member Bill Hansen said during .

Virginia has had three education chiefs since the beginning of the pandemic. James Lane, the superintendent when COVID hit, is now an acting assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Education. In that role, he recused himself from Virginia education matters and OCR hasn’t discussed the investigation with him, according to the department.

Youngkin appointed Jillian Balow to replace him. She served a little over a year before resigning in March. When she stepped down, she told ĂŰĚŇÓ°ĘÓ that special education “is the most complex work that goes on in a state agency,” but declined to make additional comments because of the lawsuit. 

Now Lisa Coons, former chief academic officer in Tennessee, is in charge. She also declined to comment on the OCR investigation, but told the board during the June meeting that she’s making changes, such as opening a parent engagement office and taking more authority over special education.

Michael Adamson, an attorney representing the family in the lawsuit against Fairfax schools and the state, said “lack of oversight … results in a kind of Wild West” and “really bad behavior” at the district level. 

‘Better off in Haiti’

The state told a Fairfax County parent in March, 2021, that it wouldn’t override a district’s decision to only offer remote learning and that district leaders were “best positioned” to determine services. By that point, federal civil rights officials were the district’s failure to provide them. 

Now Fairfax, in an agreement with OCR, must implement an to offer compensatory education — the term for make-up services districts owe students when they fail to provide them in the first place. The district wouldn’t comment on the state’s guidance.

Bush and his wife, who adopted two children from Haiti in 2013, had a similar experience. His 11-year-old son, who is autistic, was among the first students that the Arlington Public Schools allowed to return to school in January of 2021. But he spent his days on an iPad, learning from an aide in another room, despite a doctor’s recommendations that he needed to interact with other children. The Arlington district did not respond to a request for comment.

Bush’s son lost reading skills, made up imaginary friends after months of isolation and, like some children with autism, began incessantly “scripting” — repeating lines from movies or TV shows. In his son’s case, it was play-by-play commentary from football games. He did hundreds of cartwheels a day and lost motivation for learning and wrestling, a sport in which he had excelled.

“He really nosedived. We’re still trying to get him back,” Bush said. “My son would be better off in Haiti of all places. They kept .”

Bush and other parents continued to face opposition when asking districts for compensatory education.

His son received six and a half hours of reading support in 2021, and another 25 hours in 2022 after he showed Arlington officials test data and samples of his son’s work. Now entering sixth grade, he’s two years behind in reading.

In rural Page County, Jordan Choe’s two children, 9 and 7, have autism, ADHD and dyslexia. 

During the 2021-22 school year, Choe chose to keep the children in the Page district’s optional virtual learning program. The students had access to Edgenuity, an online learning platform, but no special education services. 

He complained to the state, which said in a letter to the family that remote learning “was never designed” to comply with special education law. 

The family eventually hired a private tutor. 

“We lived on mac and cheese and hot dogs to be able to pay for this,” Choe said. 

‘Not unique’

Special education advocates say Virginia waited too long to heed the federal government’s warnings. But families in the state certainly aren’t the only ones still seeking compensatory education

“What is happening in Virginia is not unique,” said Diana Heldfond, founder and CEO of Parallel Learning, a company that provides virtual assessment, therapy and instruction for districts, including some in Virginia. 

She partly attributed the breakdown of special education during the pandemic to underfunding.The law says federal funds should cover 40% of the cost of education for students with disabilities, but in reality it’s . 

Students and teachers pay the price, said Anne Holton, another Virginia state board member.

“I have seen … teachers [with] …essentially no training at all dealing with some of our children with the toughest needs,” she said during the June meeting. “It’s no surprise at all to me that … everybody is frustrated, including the teacher.”

Disclosure: Andy Rotherham is a member of the Virginia Board of Education and a member of ĂŰĚŇÓ°ĘÓ’s Board of Directors.