hello and welcome to CNN 10 your daily
10 minutes of news where I simply tell
you the what letting you decide what to
think i'm Ky Wire here in San Antonio
home of the 2025 NCAA Men's Final Four
where a national champion will be
crowned tonight it has been so nice to
meet some of you while I've been here
great people great food this place is
pretty awesome we're going to start
today with some American history behind
me is the Alamo in 1836 the Battle of
the Alamo became a pivotal event in
Texas's fight for independence from
Mexico on February 23rd Mexican forces
led by General Antonio Lopez de Santaa
began a 13-day siege of the fort the
outnumbered Alamo defenders led by James
Bowie William Travis and even famed
frontiersman Davy Crockett eventually
were overpowered but the defeat
galvanized the rest of Texas and later
that year they'd win their independence
and remember the Alamo became a famous
battlecry during the Mexican-American
War of 1846 to 1848 today the Alamo is
Texas's only UNESCO World Heritage site
and most visited landmark it's in the
midst of a $550 million enhancement
effort it'll open in 2027 complete with
a 4D theater and 5,000 artifacts telling
the Alamo's full 300-year history from
indigenous history to the Texas
Revolution and civil rights movement now
to an issue affecting students and
educators in schools everywhere the
debate over banning cell phones from the
classroom phone-free schools are
becoming more common across the US
several states have introduced policies
that ban or restrict cell phone use in
schools with more than a dozen other
states and Washington DC introducing
statewide legislation to ban or restrict
them in the future the issue is a rare
instance of bipartisanship uniting state
leaders on both sides of the political
aisle legislators have pointed to
harmful mental health impacts from
smartphone use to justify the bans and
with screen time rising among teens
those in favor of phone bands say they
lead to fewer distractions in the
classroom our Pamela Brown met with
students at a high school in Arlington
Virginia where students are required to
put their phones inside magnetic locking
pouches every morning here's what some
of them have to think about the policy
raise your hand if you're a fan of this
new phone free policy at the school
um it's complicated this Virginia high
school looks like any other during
passing periods but notice one thing's
missing i remember the first day I was
sitting in physics my phone was locked
up in my back and I kept reaching for it
but I couldn't and the only thing I can
do was sit on my computer and listen
wakefield High is a guinea pig of sorts
students are expected to store their
phones in this magnetic locking pouch
throughout the day at first there was
resistance people were putting dents and
holes in the wall like there were tables
we had to like get fixed right after we
got them when I walked in the cafeteria
all you hear is just like the bang greg
Cabana a government teacher at Wakefield
noticed it too the fact that they're
banging pouches around the cafeteria
trying to unlock their phone this is
proving our point right here of how
meaningful and how powerful that phone
is cabana has been advocating for
stricter regulations on phones for years
after feeling like his role as an
educator was secondary to being the
phone police as a teacher it was just
daily judgment calls put your phone away
put your phone away should I say
something to the student should I keep
on teaching should I talk to them in the
hallway is it worth it it may be too
soon to fully understand the impact of
phones on academic performance
especially talking to this group of
high-erforming students i think it
depends on who you were before the phone
policy but other benefits inside the
classroom are clear even just picking it
up for a small time can take away from
like your learning experience it's not a
small improvement it is it is a dramatic
improvement back um to engaging fun
teaching with student interaction the
2023 surgeon general's report says up to
95% of kids 13 to 17 use social media
former surgeon general Dr vic Morphy
even called for tobacco style warning
labels on social media platforms saying
they're associated with significant
mental health harms for adolescents the
data also shows when kids are spending
more than 3 hours on average that they
face nearly double the risk increased
risk of depression and anxiety symptoms
but a recent CDC study found about 50%
of teenagers between ages 12 and 17 had
four or more hours of daily screen time
i definitely prefer having it but um I
mean I I get more work done do you
realize did it make you realize you have
an emotional attachment to it oh I think
I knew that before and I was just kind
of avoiding that fact you were avoiding
that fact before but now it's like in
your face real oh yeah now I know I'm
addicted every day I go straight to my
phone when I get home don't even think
about the homework but when he's in the
walls of Wakefield he's opening up in
other ways i feel like I connect with
more people and like have better
conversations than I could have had with
the phone student Karen M says it's led
to a new kind of engagement even just
like at lunch you like talk to each
other you know like people bring games
to class and that's something I had
never experienced you never experienced
that kind of engagement well it was just
like and maybe not since kindergarten
maybe not since preschool and the
students and teachers here say less
isolation has meant less interpersonal
conflict there were a lot less fights i
haven't seen any this year the movement
to restrict cell phones in classrooms is
growing with nine states having already
passed a ban or restricted cell phone
use in schools and 15 states plus the
District of Columbia have introduced
legislation to do the same but not every
educator is on board including Brandon
Cardett Hernandez a former public school
principal in New York we have to teach
digital literacy skills like kids need
to know how to use social media and by
an outright ban of smartphones in
schools we are not getting any closer to
teaching those skills he also worries
that lowincome students relying on the
school for access to reliable Wi-Fi are
being forgotten in the discussion kids
who are ready the most vulnerable and
the most underresourced schools who are
already experiencing skill gaps those
are the kids who are going to be the
most harmed there's also a very real
concern about what happens during an
emergency i know one of the biggest
things that people are worried about was
if there's like a lock down and like
there's someone in the school and you
need to text your parents and then all
the parents would be going crazy because
they can't text their kids they don't
know if they're okay cabana points out
that he thinks phones can do more harm
than good in those situations
misinformation could be put out on
phones um incorrect rumors um perhaps
panicking when there shouldn't be that
would just be a hindrance to keeping
students safe so while the jury is still
out if this group would recommend a ban
in other schools one thing is clear
unplugging for them means a nuisance of
freedom that's the part I've really
loved most just like honestly the weight
that's kind of been lifted off my
shoulders this freedom taken from us but
we've like gained another freedom um I
guess like a mental freedom so I really
appreciate that
that was good that was good
pop quiz hot shot what is located on the
top floor of the US Supreme Court
building a diner a gym chapel or an
observatory answer is the Supreme Court
gym it comes complete with a basketball
court fittingly named the highest court
in the land where justices clerks and
staff can hoop it
up today's story getting a 10 out of 10
some words of wisdom for all the leaders
and leaders in the making out there
ahead of the final four over the weekend
I got to chat with all four of the head
coaches who've had their teams led to
the biggest stage in college basketball
through all the ups and downs in this
whirlwind of a season i asked Duke's
John Shy Florida's Todd Golden Houston's
Kelvin Samson and Auburn's Bruce Pearl
what's one of the keys to being a great
leader trust in your players trust in
your staff everybody making sacrifices
you know for the greater good understand
that when we as a team are successful
you as an individual will benefit far
more i try to lead you know from uh kind
of the players perspective and even
though obviously I'm the head coach I
want them to feel like I'm in it with
them you know one of our kind of
traditions is shooting half court shots
the day before the game and and that was
an example of that today
somewhere along the way I' I' I've
learned the importance of being a
servant leader um and not a boss i like
working with people and helping them
become better at whatever they're doing
and uh I I think it that should always
be a joint effort i've learned that in
order to ask anybody to to do anything
you better be willing to do it yourself
and that's something I've always tried
to take pride in all right and good luck
to Coach Golden's Gators and Coach
Samson's Cougars tonight in the national
championship game all right it is time
for our favorite part of the show we've
got a Texas size shout out going to
Mound City School in Mound City Missouri
we see you Panthers and from right here
in Texas this shout out goes to Mr
dominguez and all our friends at Eagle
Pass High School in Eagle Pass Texas
rise up let's giddy up make this an
awesome week i'll see you right back
here tomorrow from the Lonear State i'm
Cody Wire and we are CNN 10