Linden school district limits its searches of students' cell phones

In schools across the country, cell phones go on and cell phones get confiscated, often on a daily basis.

Students may lose their beloved phone for the rest of the school day. But they don't expect to lose their privacy.

In a small town east of Stockton, that is what happened to a senior named Justin Tomek at Linden High School last October. Several months later, the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California weighed in.

And on Wednesday – with little fanfare – the Linden Unified School District board revised its policy on cell phones to better protect the text messages, photos and other private communications embedded in students' telephones.

For teenagers, such protections are of deep value. Like diaries and letters in the days of old, today's modern cell phones carry thoughts, conversations and images involving best friends, family members and romantic interests. They may be snippets of sentences, but they can be as personal and private as any eloquent journal entry.

"Schools need to understand that just because a student uses a cell phone when he or she is not supposed to doesn't mean the school has a license to go in and read their private messages," said Ann Brick, an ACLU staff attorney in San Francisco who got involved in the Linden situation after learning of Tomek's experience.

"It's like rummaging through their private letters," she said.

For Tomek, a senior who keeps his grades high and is the captain of his baseball team, Oct. 25 did not start out well. He and his mother had a small argument before school. During his P.E. class, he called her on his cell to apologize.

He knew it was against the rules at Linden High to use a cell phone while classes were running. Sure enough, he got caught.

It wasn't until he went to pick up his phone after school that the real surprise hit: He couldn't have his phone back because a teacher had not finished going through his text messages.

His reaction: "I was embarrassed. They were reading my personal information. They read through all of it."

Eventually he retrieved his phone. The situation didn't sit well with his mother, Barbara Tomek. She contacted the ACLU.

On March 3, Brick sent a letter to Linden Unified stating that the board's policy permitting searches of text messages, phone calls and photos on student cell phones was excessively broad and violated the Fourth Amendment and the California Constitution's provisions providing privacy for people of all ages.

On Wednesday, the Linden school board tightened its policy to say educators could only read text messages or look at photos on student cell phones if they believe such a search would show a school rule or law was violated. The new policy also limits the scope of such searches.

"We want to be compliant with the law," Linden Superintendent Ronald Estes said Thursday. "We worked it out pretty quickly."

Estes added that the search of Tomek's messages was "a confusing incident" and involved Tomek's best interests. He said he couldn't elaborate.

To students, the thought of adults scrolling through their cell phones is unnerving.

"It's like going in and reading somebody's mail or their e-mail," said Brooke Bischoff, a senior at Bella Vista High in Fair Oaks.

"It's pretty much unspoken with your friends that if you leave your cell phone at somebody's house, they don't go through your text messages," she said.

Cell phone policies vary from district to district. Schools typically ban their use during classes. Some include lunch and passing periods. The policies can keep school officials busy, said Elizabeth Graswich, spokeswoman for the Elk Grove Unified School District.

"Cell phones are very popular," she said. "They are taking cell phones on a daily basis."

Elk Grove, as well as the Grant Joint Union High School District, spell out the bans in their districtwide policies, but unlike Linden Unified, do not formally address whether staff members may read messages or listen to voice mails on confiscated phones.

A school staff member would only do so if there were reason to believe a law was broken, or for health and safety concerns, said Jacques Whitfield, counsel for Grant Joint Union. In such cases, they would look at messages only under consultation with campus security or law enforcement officials, he said.

Craig Murray, principal of Grant High School, said there are good reasons for banning cell phones during classes, including the potential for students to cheat on tests by taking pictures on camera phones and sharing the images.

Disruptions are another worry, Murray said: "The last thing I want to see in a chemistry class is a student saying, 'Excuse me, chemistry teacher. I've gotta take this phone call. Can you hold up the lecture?' "

For Tomek, the cell phone drama has offered a lesson more powerful than any school lecture. He recently finished a review of various interest groups in his government class. Among those he studied – and now has come to know firsthand – is the American Civil Liberties Union.

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• Call The Bee's Deb Kollars, (916) 321-1090.