Inside Scotland's first 'phone-free' school in Edinburgh

The Herald Scotland

07-05-2025

After a quick final check of notifications devices are inserted into the fabric cases — where they'll remain until the end of the school day.
As pupils move past reception and through the atrium, they lock the magnetic pin on their pouch at locking stations fixed to walls on either side of the hall.
It's the first time this technology, developed and patented by American company Yondr, has been introduced in any school in Scotland, although it has been rolled out in around 250 schools elsewhere in Britain. The pilot project promises to make Portobello High a 'phone free' environment with fewer distractions, with a second Edinburgh school on the other side of the city, Queensferry High, also implementing the change from next Wednesday, May 14.
But will it work?
The bold new policy comes on the back of efforts to discourage phone use during class time, which have largely proved ineffective. Portobello High School headteacher Greg McDowall told The Herald there was now the need for a "physical barrier" between pupils and their phones.
"The mobile phone is an incredibly addictive tool and device and it's a lot of responsibility to put on a young person to self-manage when they check notifications, apps and so on," he said.
Portobello pupils with their phone pouches at a locking station (Image: The Herald)
"So we're taking that responsibility away from them and actually to make their classroom experience more enjoyable, distraction free and try and improve concentration levels."
Nationally, he said, strong evidence was emerging of the negative health and wellbeing impact of continuous phone use which supported this level of restriction.
Asked whether putting the onus on pupils to lock away their devices risked the system not being properly enforced, Mr McDowall said this had been considered and adaptations could be made during the pilot.
'We have considered that through dialogue and looking at where this policy has been used in other countries and try to learn from that," he said.
"There will be checks and balances of all these approaches, but for us the pouch is really key to this; we can't have a situation going forward where the pouch becomes redundant and we rely on just the phone in the bag.
'Consistency is absolutely key to the success of the implementation of this particular policy.
"We believe that long term this is a transformational change for our school and for our young people to free up that learning experience and give them the best experience possible.'
The decision to introduce Yondr pouches follows nine months of extensive engagement with parents, staff and pupils.
City of Edinburgh Council said the cost of this was commercially sensitive information but told The Herald the pilot has been financed through a range of funding streams including funds earmarked to purchase the pouches and voluntary contributions from parents.
Nancy Rigg, chair of Portobello High School parent council, said: 'This is a pilot, there are probably still things we need to learn.
"It's the first in Scotland but it's the start of the direction of travel for this school. It had to be what is right for Portobello High; there has to be a consultation to work out what's best for your school, this won't be a roll-out everywhere exactly as is.
"And I think it's important that the pupils, parents and carers were all part of this conversation. This wasn't something the school decided to do, it was something we all looked at and shaped to get to where we are today.
"It's disruptive in class if teachers are constantly dealing with issues to do with people having phones when they're not supposed to, it takes away from teaching time. You can deal with it but it doesn't mean the education in class is focused because it's constantly interrupted.
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"We looked at lots of different options, what this one does is allows pupils to have their own phone during the day, we're not taking hundreds of phones and the school is responsible for them, but it means they're not accessible during the school day."
Rigg believes pupils shunning the new system will be "few and far between".
She said: 'There's been a huge consultation with the pupils. It went to the pupil parliament – the pupils have their own parliament here which is about 80 odd representatives – so this has gone through lots of conversations, lots of iterations. I wouldn't say everybody is fully on board with it, but I think there's been enough support."
Councillor Joan Griffiths, the council's education convener, hoped to see the policy introduced at every secondary school in Edinburgh, although each school is left to decide their individual mobile phone policy.
"There will be things we think we've maybe not got quite right, so it's a pilot and we will learn," Cllr Griffiths said. "Queensferry is next week and I would really hope that other schools will come on board and take it forward.
'What I'm hoping for is that children and young people will see the benefits of it, that they go into classrooms, and they're actually having conversations with people, they're talking to people rather than texting people and they will get used to that.
'Pupils are really, really excited about it all and I'm hoping we can keep that excitement with them. I think young people are up for trying something new.'