The topic of cellphones in school continues to make headlines. I've read and heard no small number of reports about school districts in numerous countries and cities restricting or forbidding the use of cellphones in school. Every report seems to indicate that the less students use their cellphones in school, the better they are likely to concentrate and learn, and the fewer emotional issues they are likely to have.
This week, we'll look at cellphones in schools, taking data from the National Center for Education Statistics, part of the US government's Department of Education. Their "School Pulse Panel" is a representative sample of schools that regularly provide updates on a wide range of topics. The SPP survey has recently started to ask about cellphones, Internet access, and related topics in their surveys. The latest survey, available from https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/spp/results.asp , and I thought it would be interesting to explore and find out just how cellphone usage is perceived.
Data and five questions
The data comes from the SPP in the form of an Excel file. Go to the SPP page, and scroll down to the "technology" section, at https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/spp/results.asp#technology-dec24-chart-1 . You can then click on the link https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/spp/docs/release/Technology.xlsx , labeled "see full data for 2024-2025 technology."
This week's learning goals include grouping and pivot tables, plotting, and multi-indexes.
Paid subscribers, including members of my LernerPython.com program, can read all of today's questions. Those subscribers will get the full set of questions and answers tomorrow, along with an invitation to office hours and downloadable data and notebooks.
Meanwhile, here are my five tasks and questions. I'll be back tomorrow with full answers and explanations:
- Read the "School Level" sheet from the Excel spreadsheet, keeping the
Subgroup,Respondents,Description,Category, andDec24 Pctcolumns. Turn # into 0, and other symbols into NaN. Replace theDec24 Pctcolumn withpercentage, a float column. Keep only those rows that contain the word "phone" or "internet" in the "Description" column. Keep only rows in which theRespondentsvalue is "All Schools". What percentage of each type of school (elementary, middle, and high) have a policy regarding cell phone usage during school hours? - One of the questions (in the
Descriptioncolumn) asks, "Which of the following best describes your school's or district's policy on students having their cell phones in the classroom?" Show the percentage of each type of school (theSubgroupcolumn) answering "Students can have their cell phones during all classes" and "Students cannot have their cell phones during any classes." Is there a significant difference? What would explain it?