West Ada School District leaders reviewed a new plan Monday night aimed at reducing student screen time across the district — and it will be implemented starting the first day of school.
The district's "Intentional Device Use" plan was presented by Chief Academic Officer of Teaching and Learning Rhonda McDonough and was developed through a guided coalition led by Amy Larson, the district's director of Data Driven Response and Instructional Technology. The coalition included 19 department leaders, more than 100 teachers, and 135 survey respondents who examined the district's one-to-one device model and its impact in classrooms.
McDonough said the plan is built on three core commitments: no devices during unstructured time for students in kindergarten through 12th grade, devices earning their place in every lesson, and acting on real data rather than assumptions.
"The work ahead of us is not deciding whether schools should be using technology at all. The questions are how technology supports learning. And when it should be used and how often," McDonough said.
WATCH | Hear from district officials on why they are making this change—
She said the plan is a starting point, not a finished product.
"This is version 1.0. It says that on purpose. Because again, I want to note that this is our starting point," McDonough said.
The plan sets specific screen-time targets by grade level. In elementary school — kindergarten through 5th grade — 90 percent of the instructional day will be screen-free. In middle school — 6th through 8th grade — 80 percent of the school day will be screen-free. No specific percentage target was set for high school, where the district said it still has more to learn about what is needed. For high school students, the focus will be on ensuring that any device use during class time is teacher-directed with a defined purpose.
The plan also defines unstructured time as screen-free for all students — including recess, breaks, transitions, lunch, indoor recess and any unscheduled blocks. For high school students, any class time on a device without a defined task also counts as unstructured. The targets exclude benchmark and state-mandated assessments and device-dependent courses.
McDonough said the cell phone restrictions the district implemented in the 2024-25 school year — directed by the board — provided a preview of what intentional device limits can accomplish. She said the impact was undeniable, and that students themselves testified about it and appeared on the district's podcast.
"Removing the distraction helped their learning. That was clear. But it also did something we didn't fully anticipate. It opened doors that had been closed for some of them socially," McDonough said.
That experience prompted the district to look more closely at laptops and other devices in classrooms.
Superintendent Dr. Derek Bub said the plan is about putting teachers back at the center of learning.
"Teachers are at the heart of everything that we do, and so valuing what they do in front of our kids every day and not having the distraction of a laptop is important for us," Bub said.
"This is not a correction. I wanna be really clear this is not a correction. We don't think that we've done anything wrong here. This is really providing guidance so everybody knows, so our system across 60 schools is all handling technology in that same way," Bub said.
He said parent feedback has been a driving force behind the effort, and that the plan tries to find a middle ground between preparing students for a technology-driven future and protecting the primacy of the teacher-student relationship.
"How do we put some guard rails around that and make that a really public statement to say, hey, kids learn best when they have great teachers in front of them," Bub said.
This fall, West Ada will use Lightspeed Digital Insights data to better understand student device use and inform next steps. The district will also gather feedback from students, families, teachers and other stakeholders throughout the semester.
By the end of the first semester, the district aims to develop a recommendation on its one-to-one student device model and further refine screen time guidelines — with those recommendations brought back to the board for consideration in planning the 2027-28 school year.
