"Krone" commentary

Banning cell phones is all well and good, but please include bids!

Susanne Wiesinger is a teacher at a hotspot school in Vienna-Favoriten and an author.

(Bild: stock.adobe.com, Krone KREATIV)

The cell phone in Daria's school bag rang again. But cell phones were banned at my secondary school at the time. This was decided with the parents' association and recorded in the house rules.

Quite annoyed, I demanded her notebook. Daria started sobbing. Her mother was in a bad way, so she called me often. As her mother couldn't speak German, I allowed the girl to call her back herself. The reason this time: Daria was supposed to pick up her little brother from elementary school. I couldn't allow that, after all, our lessons lasted another two hours.

Why do I remember this experience? There is supposed to be a ban on cell phones at all Austrian primary and secondary schools. That's a good thing. But perhaps it's more about prohibitions than bans. In addition to the cell phone ban, the new black-red-pink federal government apparently also wants to make parents more accountable. I think that's even better.

Fathers and mothers are not only responsible for their children's cell phone use. Above all, they have to make sure that young people can concentrate on school and don't have to play "substitute parents".

Demanding responsibility will probably be more difficult than banning cell phones. But it is not impossible. Apart from parenting advice, the best way to do this is with money. The money that should be cut in the event of neglect.