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Phone Time, Paint Top Students' Wish List

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By MARILYN BROWN, The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 30, 2008

TAMPA - Hillsborough County high school students want to turn their cell phones on during lunch, take more online classes and paint classroom walls more scintillating colors.

They'd also like school nurses to again dispense over-the-counter medicines and a return to study halls and the days when teachers didn't teach six out of seven class periods.

Tuesday was the annual meeting between representatives from the district's 25 high schools and school board members. The teens ask questions and share priorities. Sometimes their ideas become policy.

A change in cell phone rules - now officially restricted to after school but widely used for text-messaging all day - may be possible, board members allowed, as they are updating all policies.

"You live in a different world," board chairwoman Jennifer Faliero told students. "We need to reconsider how we interact with you."

Board member April Griffin told them, however, "Your friends are taking pictures of fights at school and posting them on MySpace," leading to more fights. Others use cell phones to cheat.

"You have a few who are messing it up for everybody," she told them, challenging them to take care of the problem through Youth Crime Watches. She also suggested that program as one option for a student at King High, who asked for surveillance help for break-ins of cars in the student and teacher parking lots.

As for the cutback in school nurses and loss of their ability to dispense over-the-counter drugs, board members said they want to return to that program. That's being studied, along with repercussions of requiring high school teachers to teach six of seven class periods, they promised.

More online classes are in the works, students were told. Crowded schools, the tightening class size amendment and disruptive students make it practical, Faliero said. She suggested a way to deal with disruptive students: "Send them to an online class - that's high school reform."

Board members said they liked ideas proposed by two Durant High juniors.

David Rosely suggested allowing students to do on-the-job training in custodial and cafeteria jobs at schools.

"I love the idea," board member Candy Olson said, noting a shortage in those areas.

Student DeeDee Cardenas suggested painting classrooms "scintillating colors" because research shows they enhance student learning.

"Tell me what they are - we'll go to Home Depot and get some paint," Board member Doretha Edgecomb told her.

Edgecomb was one of the board members who praised students for their sensitivity to others, including requesting more reading and foreign language for younger siblings to adding more recycling programs.

Teenagers are criticized for being self-serving and self-centered, Edgecomb said.

"You're everything but that," she told the students.

Reporter Marilyn Brown can be reached at mbrown@tampatrib.com or (813) 259- 8069.

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