Posted on 01/01/2007 1:45:53 PM PST by Coleus
Joe Skarimbas was just learning to read when he decided he was ready to join the digital age. "When he went to first grade he said, 'When am I going to get a cell phone?'" said Joe's mother, Tara Skarimbas.
The Leonia family decided to hold off on getting young Joe a phone until he turns 10 and starts walking home from school alone. But his mother understands the temptation to get her son, who turns 8 this month, a cell phone as soon as possible.
"Just for safety purposes," she said, glancing toward the new Disney Mobile kiosk during a shopping trip to the Paramus Park mall last week.
As the adult and teenage cell phone market becomes saturated, cell phone companies are targeting younger and younger users. This holiday season several companies -- including Disney, Verizon, TicTalk and Firefly -- are pushing brightly colored cell phones specially designed for children as young as kindergartners.
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
http://www.electronic-school.com/2000/09/0900sbot.htmlPagers versus cell phones
In the early 1990s, electronic paging devices or pagers became synonymous with drug dealers. Although pagers had other, more benign uses, schools and state legislatures quickly passed policies and laws forbidding their use in schools, often with severe penalties attached.
According to the Education Commission on the States, 16 states have passed laws that ban student possession of pagers in schools. Of those states, five mention only pagers. The other states include cellular phones and other electronic devices. All the laws allow for school boards or principals to make exceptions, some for medical emergencies.
It was a different story when parents and students found out the ban covered cell phones as well. "We are hearing a great deal from parents who believe [the phones are] a part of modern-day life and students should be able to use them," says Gordon, whose district is in an affluent suburb of Washington, D.C. "We are approaching that point where we will have to make a distinction between pagers and cell phones." Montgomery County's state legislature tried to do exactly that recently by proposing Maryland's law be amended to allow cell phones in schools. That effort failed, Gordon says, with lawmakers from large, urban areas on one side and rural lawmakers on the other. "Those from rural districts didn't see the need for cell phones," she says.
In Franklin, Wis., the school board first banned pagers, then broadened the policy to include two-way electronic communication devices. Dave Szychlinski, president of the Franklin School Board, says the broad language was necessary because it could include up-and-coming technology, such as handheld computers like Palm Pilots. "Students functioned well before cell phones," says Szychlinski. "They're not necessary for students in their daily activities."
OMG look at this do we have signature experts here on Canteen check this outtt
http://www.blairhouse.org/s_guestbook.html
They can only keep the "violent" sex offender who preys on children from living near schools, parks, libraries etc...
Technology is a tool, no different from a hammer or a saw. Some people have the ability to apply them with more skill than others.
And, as I've said many times before: for better or worse, you don't get to grow old in the same world into which you were born.
Now that funny ROFL
Post that at Canteen Monk Tomkow would love it
I was able to communicate with my son and hear everything that happened in the classroom, I was also able to allow other parents to communicate with their children.
Do you have children?
This does not seem to be that difficult of a concept to grasp.
Get a grip on reality.
The purpose of having a cell phone is to be able to communicate.
I was able to communicate with my son and provide a means of communication to other concerned parents.
Try to stay on topic.
if your child is ever taken they can dial 911 on the cell phone and the towers the phone uses to continue the call can provide useful info on where the child is. (I wish my kids had this protection when they were taken)
Aw come on, get the kid a MySpace account too!
The kids gotta learn to carry a dime in their penny loafers!
Pedophiles use the internet. So do you. Hmmmm.
What if you are so wrong? Have you looked at the emission pattern of the typical cellphone antenna? What kind of RF diagnostic equipment have you personally used to examine cell phone emissions? Or do you rely on the MSM for your information?
Thanks Hottie...I'll check into that.
I use prepaid TracPhone. Service is through Verizon. I pay about $100 for one year service and that comes with 300 or 400 minutes. I hope they have the same plan available when I go to get the phone, but the last time I checked, they didn't. The new plan is similiar, but slightly more expensive...and I don't like the phone as well.
Sure, out here in the boonies there is no such thing as a pay phone.
I agree.
The focus seems to be heavy on
entrapping the Internet Predators
these days.
it was worse years ago, the crime rates are at their lowest today. years ago crime rates were their highest in the 60's we had the threat of global thermo nuclear war, our air and water was super polluted, we had air raid drills in schools, fall-out shelters, race riots, the inner city and ghettos, you couldn't walk in New York City at night, Times Square was a hole, girls didn't know karate or how to handle a situation and so much more ALL WITHOUT THE USE OF CELL PHONES TO PROTECT THEMSELVES.
I gotta agree with you. It WAS worse back then.
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