Sector awareness and need for a solution keeps increasing. AFR...

Sector awareness and need for a solution keeps increasing. AFR article from today:

A Perth principal on a mission to improve teenage sleep patterns has convinced 600 students to give up their mobile phones in exchange for a good old fashioned alarm clock.

In what she still hopes will take off as a national or even global movement, Presbyterian Ladies' College principal Kate Hadwen, wrote to parents in October proposing a bedroom ban on devices such as phones, televisions and laptops after lights out.

Dr Hadwen knew many studies were proving a link between sleeplessness and electronic devices, but as she pressed send on the note to parents she worried it would be viewed as an unwelcome intrusion on their home lives.

She needn't have worried. "The response from parents and students has been amazing, overwhelmingly positive," Dr Hadwen told The Australian Financial Review on Wednesday.

With the biggest excuse for needing a mobile phone being to set an alarm for the morning, Dr Hadwen decided to hand out free alarm clocks to every student who pledged to surrender their technology at bedtime every night. Parents are informed of the pledge, which gives them ammunition to argue the toss at home.

That was 600 alarm clocks ago.

"We sold out K-Mart in Western Australia. We had to get them shipped in from other states."

Phone use at night on the rise
Dr Hadwen was spurred into action by world-first research which found that more than three quarters of adolescents were using their phones well into the night, up from 15 per cent in 2011.

"Griffith and Murdoch University researchers recently tracked late-night usage of mobile phones over three years in a large sample of Australian teens and found this was directly associated with poorer sleep, poorer mental health outcomes, reduced coping and lower self-esteem," she wrote.

"This represents only a sample of the compelling evidence around the harm from teenagers' usage of technology late into the night."

Dr Hadwen's letter went on to recommend that "as a community we commit to collecting the technology off our children at bed time, at least for students in pre-kindergarten to Year 11."

The result? Lots of happy parents and more productive students. "The biggest endorsement has come from the girls themselves," Dr Hadwen said, adding that because their peers were also likely to be on technology 'breaks' overnight they were less susceptible to "FOMO [fear of missing out)".

The lead author of the research that had Dr Hadwen so concerned is Murdoch's Lyn Vernon, who said it was the first longitudinal study of how night phone use and mental health are connected.

Set tech boundaries early
Dr Vernon's advice for families wanting to start the new school year in 2018 on a healthy note is to consider taking something like the alarm clock pledge.

"There is no doubt kids are saying up until 3am and texting or posting on social media, which is disturbing their sleep," she said.

"My advice is to set boundaries early because once the horse has bolted it is very hard to get devices out of the bedroom."

A growing number of studies demonstrated the detrimental effect of electronic devices on sleep – both in adults and children. Popular culture is peppered with stories of family-wide moratoriums on mobile phones and technology holidays.

For her part, Dr Hadwen is still fielding calls from other principals around Australia and overseas after her letter to parents appeared in media reports.

When a copy of one of the articles was posted on LinkedIn this week, principals and teachers were quick to agree late-night device use should be banned.

And not just for health reasons, but in response to bullying and other security concerns.

Canley Vale High School principal Peter Rouse responded: "Every year I provide my parents with school rules for them. Rule No 1 is remove devices from bedrooms. You may be surprised as to how many parents feel that they can not intrude on their child's space. Rule No 2 is explore your child's digital and physical space."

Alan Dawson, deputy principal at Richard Johnson Anglican School, agreed. "Technology ban after bedtime = perfect!!" he wrote. "Child to bed. Technology to bed."