Jeffco school board adopts student device policy on 4-1 vote before state deadline

Jeffco Public Schools’ board adopted the district’s student device policy June 11 on a 4-1 vote, formally approving rules the district had already posted ahead of the state’s July 1 deadline.

The meeting record shows directors Michelle Applegate, Erin Kenworthy, Peter Gibbins and Tina Moeinian voted yes, while Denine Echevarria voted no. During the board’s discussion, Echevarria said she opposed the measure because it did not go far enough toward a stricter “away all day” rule for all grades.

Under the adopted JSA-R regulation, students in grades K-8 may not use phones or earbuds during the school day on campus and devices must remain “off and away.” For grades 9-12, phones and earbuds must stay off and away during instructional time, with exceptions allowed by a supervising educator for a specific academic purpose or by school leaders in alternative-school and career-and-technical-education settings.

The same adopted policy packet says students must use district-assigned devices for schoolwork during the school day and may not use personal laptops or tablets for that purpose.

The main dispute in the June 11 debate was whether high school students should face a bell-to-bell restriction. During public comment and board discussion, supporters of a broader ban argued the district should require phones to stay away all day for all grades, including lunch and passing periods. The adopted policy instead limits high school phone use during instructional time.

Board documents show schools have more than a year to fully align with the new rules. The policy packet says schools were to begin working toward implementation once the board approved the policy and must be “in full compliance with all requirements of the policy by July 2027.” The regulation also says each school must publish or update its campus policy on its website before the school year starts.

That leaves room for campus-level differences this fall. The adopted regulation leaves schools responsible for defining storage expectations, enforcement procedures, retrieval of confiscated devices and other rules for instructional and non-instructional time, while requiring them to follow districtwide guidelines. During the June 11 discussion, board members described that flexibility as one reason they viewed the policy as a starting point rather than an endpoint.

The adopted exception language says schools may not restrict personal-device use when it is needed for a medical emergency, medically necessary purposes or a disability-related accommodation.

One issue remains unclear in the adopted packet. The JSA policy language says violations may result in discipline under the district matrix “up to and including suspension or expulsion,” but it also says suspension and expulsion are not sanctioned disciplinary actions for cell phone infractions under that same matrix. The public records reviewed for this story do not resolve that apparent conflict.

During the meeting discussion, multiple board members also said they want follow-up reports on how enforcement works in practice, whether discipline is applied consistently, and whether the rules affect academics, educator workload and equity.

Jeffco’s action follows a 2025 Colorado law requiring school boards, charter schools and the Colorado School for the Deaf and the Blind to adopt, implement and post a student communication-device policy by July 1, 2026. The Colorado Department of Education says the law is intended to reduce distractions and cyberbullying while supporting student health, safety and welfare.

Compared with the version Jeffco had already posted before the vote, the public records reviewed for this update do not show a major last-minute rewrite to the grade-band rules, exceptions or overall enforcement structure. The board’s formal adoption sets a districtwide floor while school-by-school implementation continues into the 2026-27 school year.