Video, Audio, Photos & Rush Transcript: Governor Hochul and Finger Lakes Region School Leaders Highlight Plans to Implement Bell-to-Bell Smartphone Restrictions This Fall

Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul held a roundtable with Finger Lakes region school leaders, parents and students to highlight their plans for implementing bell-to-bell smartphone restrictions when school resumes this fall. The roundtable included representatives of Monroe-2 Orleans BOCES, Rochester City School District, Greece Central School District, Holley Central School District and Spencerport Central School District — all of whom have already finalized their distraction-free policy. Today’s event follows previous roundtables held by the Governor this summer in New York City, the Capital Region and Central New York, with additional roundtables to come before the start of school.

VIDEO: The event is available to stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

AUDIO: The Governor's remarks are available in audio form here.

PHOTOS: The Governor's Flickr page will have photos of the event here.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

I want to thank everyone who's joined us this morning. Superintendent Putnam for hosting us at BOCES, and BOCES is something I'm well familiar with because I was in BOCES in high school. There actually was a government studies program, and I was the youngest student in it, I think it was mostly seniors and I was a junior. And we were able to select a government internship, and I selected working where I got into courts. I worked for campaigns and worked for politics and worked in government, even when I was a high school junior. Part of it was a week-long trip to our state capitol. We stayed with host families, and that week was transformative for me. I realized the power of government to do good for people, and I credit BOCES for putting me on this journey here today. And also our county executive, always great to be back in Monroe County. I’m here often and delighted with your leadership, especially as we embrace this brave new world we're entering into in the next couple of weeks. So I appreciate your assistance with getting the word out to families.

The dean of our assembly delegation, Harry Bronson has joined us. Where's Harry sitting? Thank you very much for joining us. You have been an advisor of mine since I was back in the early days in Congress, so we go way back. I was proud to represent the Spencerport area. It was part of my congressional district. And Josh Jensen, a New York State Assemblymember. Thank you for joining us, I know this is an important issue to you and your constituents, so I appreciate you being here very much. Well, the reason we're here, the home stretch everybody. You know what I've done, going on two years of traveling to every corner of the state to have conversations about what is happening to our children. And what I saw was young people under enormous stress from pressure and still coming outta the pandemic. And any adult who thinks our young people are over the pandemic, you're assessing the situation wrongly because when you talk to teenagers, they remember how scary it was and paralyzing it was in remote education for however long it was. That had a lingering effect on them.

When we think about it, we got through it, it was a few years. Well, when you're very young that couple of years is a big percentage of your life, the time you've been here. So it's real, that took a psychological effect. But also I've learned that there's a through line between when cell phones were allowed in schools and we had social media algorithms that were addictive, it goes back about a decade, and the rise of mental health challenges, whether it's anxiety, depression, suicidal thoughts among our students. The trend line is parallel, the two of them going up at the same time. And so as New York's first mom governor, I did these roundtables and listened to young people — and when one young woman said, “we know we should put them down. We know we're being held captive and we can't really break from the clutches of this. But we cannot be the only one, we cannot be the first, we would be ostracized forever.”

And parents didn't want to be the only ones who said, “you're leaving your cell phone at home, you're not going to school with it.” And it was even for the pressure on school boards and school districts. They've got enough to worry about; this would be a tough initiative to put forth. And so I heard from young people asking me to help them, and I heard from school districts and school superintendents and our teachers who are on the front lines of this, dealing with the challenge of competing with TikTok dance videos when they're trying to teach math class, and they knew they were losing the battle. So this whole confluence of forces where it rose up. And I realized I'm the only one who can do something of consequence here. And I'm willing to go into the line of fire and be one of the very first states to have a full declaration that we'll have distraction-free schools. No cell phones, no Apple watches, no earbuds for the duration of the school day, bell to bell.

And we did a lot of research, a lot of work, a lot of preparation. And I feel that we're ready, and part of it was to make sure that our school districts showed us their plan. Show us that you're ready for this. And so we have a deadline, a little past, and I'm proud to announce that of the 1100 school districts, including BOCES and charter schools, which were not in our earlier calculations, we're closing in on about 940. When I went to bed last night it was 920, so the numbers are ticking up okay. Even adults like to procrastinate, but some have a good excuse because they had to announce this at their earlier meetings, and then the next meeting might not be until later in August — and so they've asked for some grace period.

So, we get it. But by and large, the school districts are responding. They've done a lot of outreach with the parents and hopefully the students. And I also have one more message for the parents: This is going to be a huge transition for your children — enormous. If you're a smoker one day and the next day you don't have a pack of cigarettes, that's a rough time for you. So the addiction, the addictive properties of our social media algorithms — which we now ban social media companies from blasting these out against our children, but it's still occurring.

And so, I would suggest that parents try to talk to each other, find strategies. One school superintendent told me that in his own household, they have cell phone-free Mondays in their family over the summer just to get the kids used to it.

And he goes, “Guess what? My teenagers are actually playing board games. I didn't know they knew how.” And they're already seeing different things happen. Teenagers are maybe fighting once in a while. I grew up in a big family, a lot of conflict, but they're talking to each other, they're communicating, they're making eye contact, they're communicating at dinner time.

So that lost art of communication at home and in our schools is something we're going to restore, and I guarantee one year from now, we're going to have a healthier student body across the State of New York. And ultimately when they emerge into society graduating from high school, they'll be more highly functioning adults. They'll be able to work in groups and collaboratively. They won't be these people that are challenged with social interaction because they've spent their entire four years or career in school staring at a cell phone — and that's what we're breaking into and that is going to be a challenge.

I hope other states will follow our lead and what we're doing. And being New York, we're always bold. We're not the first, but I think we'll be the first big state, and I do believe that this is going to be a transformational opportunity for us. And the next generations of students coming up will never, ever know this challenge of having cell phones in schools and this distraction all day long when their job there is to learn and to learn how to interact with other students and, certainly, their teachers.

So, I believe we've gotten to the right place. I appreciate the Legislature for standing with us in this. It is a challenge, and I will lastly say this: Expect disruptions the first few days. I guarantee people aren't sure what to do. Where do they go? Where do the students go? How long is it going to take to get in line to have each school district individually set forth their plan for basically keeping them out of students' hands. Whether it's a locking mechanism, a Yondr pouch, or putting them on designated shelves — it's going to take a transition time.

So, cut everybody some slack. Be aware this is coming. Be patient and we'll get through this. As others have gone first to other counties, school superintendents have told me the first few months are tough, but then all of a sudden there's full compliance, people are used to it. And he hears that sound of laughter and kids' voices again in the hallways, which they've not heard for years. And so, that's what we're striving for here.

And so, I want to first acknowledge our school superintendent for his remarks. Thank you, again, for being a leader in this. I do believe that we'll be judged at this moment in what we're doing now — judged by future people who will say, “Everybody who stood up and were involved in making this happen successfully are part of transforming our children's lives,” and that's what you do here at BOCES every day. So, thank you, Dr. Putnam.