Starting Tuesday, students across Racine Unified School District will face new rules on when and how they can use their cellphones during the school day. Younger students in kindergarten through eighth grade must keep devices turned off and stashed away from their bodies — in a locker, for instance — for the entire school day, while high schoolers can only use their phones during passing periods and lunch, keeping them off and out of reach during class time.
A Statewide Mandate Reaches Racine
The policy stems from 2025 Wisconsin Act 42, a state law that Wisconsin passed last fall requiring every public school board to adopt rules restricting personal wireless device use during instructional time, according to FOX6 News Milwaukee. Racine Unified's Board of Education approved its version of the policy in July by a 4-1 vote, according to Citizen Portal. The board's differential approach — a full-day ban for younger students paired with more flexibility for teenagers during non-class periods — reflects how the district chose to satisfy the state's instructional-time mandate while still giving high schoolers some breathing room.
Act 42 set a July 1, 2026 deadline for every public school board in the state to adopt a policy prohibiting student use of personal wireless communication devices during instructional time. The law defines those devices broadly, covering cellphones, tablets, laptops, and gaming devices, though it explicitly exempts equipment issued by the district itself, per the Wisconsin Legislative Council.
Built-In Exceptions and Enforcement Power
The statute requires every district's policy to preserve four specific carve-outs: emergencies or perceived threats, student health care management, accommodations tied to an Individualized Education Program or Section 504 plan, and teacher-authorized educational use. Those exemptions were designed to address parental safety concerns and disability accommodations, according to the Association of Wisconsin School Administrators.
Act 42 also gives local school boards explicit authority to confiscate a student's device for the remainder of the school day as a disciplinary sanction, and Racine Unified built daily device collection into its multi-tiered enforcement protocol, per the Wisconsin Legislative Council. Districts have flexibility here because the law leaves enforcement procedures and non-instructional-hour rules, such as lunch and passing periods, up to local control.
Reporting Requirements and the Push for a Bigger Ban
Every public school board in Wisconsin must submit its adopted device policy to the state Department of Public Instruction by October 1, and then notify the agency annually thereafter of any changes. DPI is then required to forward those policies to the Department of Justice's Office of School Safety, the Legislative Council notes.
Even as districts finish rolling out Act 42's baseline rules, some state lawmakers already want to go further. State Representative Lindee Brill co-authored Assembly Bill 948 this year to expand the mandate into a full “bell-to-bell” ban that would prohibit student cellphone use during lunch, recess, and passing periods statewide, according to Civic Media. That bill emerged from the Assembly Speaker's Task Force on Protecting Kids Online, per the same outlet. A Department of Public Instruction survey for the 2024-2025 school year found that 90% of Wisconsin districts already restricted phone use during classroom time even before Act 42 passed, and 21% had already implemented full bell-to-bell bans across all their schools, according to Away For The Day.
Why Evers Signed Off
Governor Tony Evers, upon signing Assembly Bill 2 — which became Act 42 — in October 2025, said that while he generally believes education decisions should be made at the local school district level, concerns over youth mental health, classroom distractions, and social media bullying persuaded him to sign the bipartisan bill, according to the Wisconsin Office of the Governor. Evers had framed 2025 as the “Year of the Kid” in explaining his support for the statewide restriction.
Wisconsin's move puts it alongside at least 35 other states that had already enacted statewide legislation or administrative policies governing student cellphone use in public schools, according to the State Bar of Wisconsin. Lawmakers cited Pew Research Center survey data during legislative debate showing that 74% of U.S. adults support banning cellphone use during class time in middle and high schools, a figure raised by The Badger Herald.
Part of a Broader Wisconsin Conversation
Racine's rollout follows similar moves elsewhere in the state. Madison Metropolitan School District's board voted in June to implement a district-wide device ban, and a parent group there has since pushed to extend restrictions beyond phones to school-issued Chromebooks. The tension between Act 42's instructional-time floor and calls for a stricter bell-to-bell standard remains unresolved at the Capitol, even as districts like Racine Unified move ahead with their own grade-differentiated rules this week.
