Nestled around a table in the Stonelaw High School library on Thursday morning, a group of fresh-faced students extolled the virtues of their school's new policy on mobile phone use. Take their comments with a grain of salt, however - Education Secretary Jenny Gilruth was in attendance to announce government guidance on phones in the classroom, so pupils were keen to be on their best behaviour.

The school's policy is simple, or so it appears. Students must keep their mobile devices in their bags during teaching time. If they are found to be using their device, or receive an audible notification, the teacher will confiscate the phone and place it in a secured box. In exchange, students are permitted to use their phones during lunch and in non-teaching corridors between classes. 

Alfie Beacham, 14, explained the policy to me: "If you use it in class, if a notification goes off, you put it in the box."

"Your parents will get a message saying 'your child has been on their phone today'."

Waiting for the photo call with Ms Gilruth, evidence of the new policy could be seen. No less than a half dozen students walked past the press, assembled in a non-teaching corridor, heads in phones and hands typing away. 

Education secretary Jenny Gilruth at Stonelaw School in Rutherglen (Image: Colin Mearns/The Herald)

Research carried out by the school has found that many students receive more than 100 notifications per hour, mostly from social media platforms like Tiktok and Snapchat. Similarly, a bevy of studies have linked increased phone use to poor mental health and increased anxiety among teenagers.

Pupil Anna Cardwell, 16, said that some of her peers were on their phones for up to nine hours a day. 

Asked about the new policy, Cardwell remarked: "I think the happy medium between not banning it completely is really good... Banning that contact with home at lunch wouldn't be very good."

"Preventing it from being in the class takes out the distraction from learning, but giving us the trust we're going to do that and giving us the freedom to do that at lunch is more fair." 

Speaking to a pair of teachers in the ASN corridor, similar thoughts were expressed. One teacher told me that the policy had been very effective, adding that students were chatting to each other more regularly.

Call me a cynic, but I'm not convinced. Can this type of hands-off approach be enforced effectively? Maybe at the beginning of term, but what about in October, or March? Or worse still, as the summer holidays beckon?

It's not that long since I was in school, and if there's one thing I remember, it's that pupils will go to great lengths to conceal phone use. I don't want to cast aspersions on the students of Stonelaw High, who by all accounts, appeared respectful and well mannered, yet there's no doubt that the phone remains an alluring temptation to the teenage psyche. 

A critical eye must also be directed at the Scottish Government's new 'guidance', a 13 page document, which despite having a lot of words, doesn't provide much in the way of actual advice. 

Rather than introducing legislation to mandate the removal of phones during class times, the government says the decision should be left up to individual head teachers, who will be supported in whatever decision they make. 

Read more: 

In the guidance document, Ms Gilruth writes: "As Cabinet Secretary, I will support any headteacher who decides to institute a ban on mobile phones in their school."

"Crucially, however, the decision is one which rests with Scotland's headteachers, who know their pupils and their staff and who we trust to take the best decisions in the interests of their school communities."

There's truth to this perspective. Surely, a one size fits all approach is challenging to implement, especially when dealing with pupils in a variety of contexts. The needs of a small school in the islands will be much different than that of those in Glasgow or Dundee. On the other hand, a standardised policy could be important in avoiding the potential of a two-tiered system, in which schools in deprived areas institute different rules from those in more affluent neighbourhoods. 

All this to say, the question remains. Will new guidance effectively cut down on the amount of mobile phone usage by teenaged pupils, or will these individuals simply become more crafty in avoiding the long arm of the law? 

I’m not sure, but I know what angle I’d have taken as a pupil.