First UK trial of lockable smartphone pouches was a massive success
Key Points
- King's College London evaluated lockable smartphone pouches across eight Northern Ireland secondary schools
- Teachers reported less classroom disruption and better social interaction between pupils
- Pupil wellbeing measures showed negligible change, with some drop in anxiety and depression symptoms
- Younger pupils complied more readily than older ones, who called the policy disproportionate
- Researchers want longer studies covering attainment, attendance and long-term behavioural effects
Lockable smartphone pouches cut phone use across eight Northern Ireland secondary schools during the 2025-26 academic year, according to an evaluation by King’s College London.
The Department of Education in Northern Ireland funded the pilot and invited every secondary school in the region to put itself forward. Nine schools joined the evaluation and eight of them engaged fully with the researchers.
Pupils sealed their phones inside magnetically locked pouches at the start of the school day and unlocked them at the end.
They kept the pouches with them throughout the day, leaving the devices in their possession but out of reach.
“Smartphone use in classrooms has become one of the most visible behavioural and safeguarding issues facing UK post-primary schools,” said Ben Carter, Professor of Medical Statistics at King’s College London.
“While 90% now operate some form of restriction, evidence on whether more clearer restriction strategies, like a lock-and-store pouch (or brick phone only policy), actually change behaviour, attainment or wellbeing has been limited and contested.”
The team ran a mixed-methods design that tracked behaviour and attitudes before the pouches arrived and at follow-up points across the year.
Online questionnaires covered homework, classroom disruption, PE and extracurricular participation, peer interaction, smartphone use, anxiety, depression, and smartphone and social media addiction.
Schools also supplied half-termly records of exclusions, detentions, CAMHS referrals, counsellor visits and parent visits stretching back to September 2023.
Termly focus groups with pupils and staff, plus interviews with school leads, filled in how the policy worked day to day.
What the study found
Teachers reported behavioural benefits from the restriction policy, alongside a reduction in classroom disruption and better social interaction between pupils.
Almost all of them said a clear policy helped, and the pouch marked a noticeable change in how their school enforced smartphone rules.
Pupils held more mixed views on the benefits. Measures of pupil mental health and wellbeing showed negligible changes in difficulties, with some decrease in anxiety and depression symptoms.
Adherence varied by year group across the pilot. Staff saw younger pupils as more likely to comply than older ones, who viewed a blanket policy as disproportionate and incompatible with independent study.
The evaluation ran into consistent implementation problems, including:
- Inadequate locking and unlocking points at school entrances
- Damage to the pouches themselves
- Inconsistent enforcement between staff
Many of those problems proved transient, and pupils accepted them more readily at later points in the pilot.
What the researchers recommended
The team set out several recommendations for the Department of Education:
- Staff should role-model controlled smartphone use by restricting their own phone use in pupil-facing areas
- Schools should consider age-differentiated arrangements for older pupils
- The department should weigh how restriction interacts with technology in lessons, and secure access to laptops or computers to support learning and assessment
- The department or individual schools should produce standard operating guidance, staff training materials, parent communication templates, and agreed sanctions and escalation processes
The report also flagged that smartphones had become embedded in teaching and learning, with teachers using them for interactive lessons and pupils using them to reach coursework and educational resources.
“This is the first evaluation of a smartphone pouch intervention in UK schools and provides promising evidence of educational, behavioural and social benefits. But implementation matters,” said Nicky Kalk, Adjunct Senior Lecturer at King’s College London.
The researchers called for a longer study to generate robust quantitative data on attainment, attendance, exclusions, mental health outcomes, long-term behavioural effects, and the impact on disadvantaged and SEN pupils.
They also asked the department to address the barriers that stop schools taking part in research.
