While teachers might embrace technology in the classroom, the portable technology their students bring to school with them is becoming an ever-growing problem on school campuses.

“Continually, exponentially, it just continues to grow on us,” said Dr. Kent Edwards, acting superintendent of Carrollton City Schools. “It’s like kudzu.”

The school system ranks cell phone use during school as its third most common infraction, behind general misconduct and tardiness, he said.

Carroll County Schools Assistant Superintendent Christie Johnson said cell phones on the campus are becoming a very common problem, definitely in the top five discipline issues throughout the system.

“It’s a pervasive problem,” she said. “Students like electronics.”

The two systems have differing attitudes toward the phones. While the city school system allows them on campus but requires they be turned off during school hours, the county system prohibits all electronic communication devices, including cell phones, on campus at all.

While the phones may be used responsibly, both systems have seen that is not always the case. The county schools have noticed the phones can be used to harass other students, a good reason to keep them off the school grounds.

The changing technology has made cell phone use at school even more of an issue, Edwards said. While just a few years ago the phones were just used to call other people, now students can silently text, take pictures and access the Web, all things that make them easy instruments to use for cheating.

In most cases, possessing or using a cell phone at school is really a nuisance offense and doesn’t garner suspension. The problem is that the cell phone infraction is usually repeated by students over and over and multiple offenses rack up progressively stiffer penalties. That can eventually mean lost classroom time.

“It’s very dramatic, in terms of the number of school days we lose for kids in suspension consequences because they won’t stay off their cell phone,” said Jason Mundord, associate principal of Carrollton High School.

But the phones do provide some level of safety for students. If they miss the bus, or their car breaks down on the way home, help is just a phone call away.

“They’re of value to them, number one,” Edwards said. “They can’t imagine 30 minutes without a cell phone, let alone a couple days, until their parents can come pick it up.”

The city system is planning to review and rewrite its policy, keeping in mind the safety bonus the phones offer students as well as the need for instruction time uninterrupted by ringing phones and furtive glances at the cell phone screen.

The high school is hoping to have a new policy on the portable technology. The school is planning to survey other school systems on the effectiveness of their policies to get an idea of what works and what doesn’t before it starts working on the new rules.