Written Comment for tonight's BOE meeting

[Marcia Perritt]

Good evening, members of the Board. Thank you for your leadership and service to our community. My name is Marcia Perritt and I’m a parent of a first grader and future kindergartener. I volunteer weekly in the classroom at my kid’s elementary school. When people ask me how it’s going, I have a lot of nice things to say: how dedicated and caring the teachers are, how welcoming the school community is, how our principal is so energetic and engaged but—I always have a “but”—it’s been distressing to see how pervasive TV, screentime, and gamified and non-educational apps are in the classroom at the elementary level. Kids watch TV during snack time and for “brain breaks”. Screens are used to manage behavior, as a reward, and are the default for kids who finish their work early.

I’m not so naïve to believe that I’ll be able to keep my children from engaging with tech and they’ll probably, like many of us, develop some unhealthy habits with these incredibly addictive devices. But we moved into this district because we thought it was among the best in the state. I’ve been shocked to see how the classroom environment is facilitating and accelerating young children’s unhealthy relationships with screens: diminishing their ability to focus, impacting their development, and taking away opportunities for them to socialize and play.

The Digital Learning Plan is a good step in the right direction, but I urge you as leaders to please treat this issue with the urgency it deserves. I hope you all will accelerate the timeline for implementation and take a serious look at the effectiveness of the technology that has invaded our classrooms. You adopted much of this tech and these screentime practices during the pandemic at lightning speed; you can take stock and roll it back quickly, too. Our teachers and children deserve better. Thank you.