Toowoomba schools unite in groundbreaking student phone restrictions

In a groundbreaking move, three elite Queensland schools have united in a move to delay student smartphone access until after Year 7. Here’s how it would work.

School principals Dr John Kinniburgh, Emma Lowry and Dr Leigh Hobart have joined forces to ask parents not to buy a smartphone for children before Year 7.

Three of Toowoomba’s most prestigious colleges have united to urge parents to stop buying their children smartphones until well into high school.

In what is considered an Australia-first approach, Toowoomba Grammar School, Fairholme College and The Glennie School will launch the Smartphone Delay Initiative (SDI) in 2026 following extensive consultation with respective communities.

Under the SDI, which is not yet a policy or an enrolment requirement, parents have agreed to delay purchasing smartphones for their children until after Year 7, which is the first year of high school in Queensland.

Students will be allowed brick or flip phones to satisfy parents’ desire to be able to contact them during school hours.

While other schools across the country have explored such an approach, it is believed to be the first time a collection of institutions have worked together to empower parents to restrict access to this technology, which has been linked to a range of harmful social and health effects for children and teenagers.

The push comes just weeks out from when the federal government’s new age restrictions on social media apps come into effect on December 10.

The laws were heavily influenced by News Corp’s Let Them Be Kids campaign, which explored the horrific impact social media and new technology has had on children’s wellbeing.

Extensive research has supported the idea of delaying smartphone ownership for children, with psychologists linking it to increases in depression, anxiety and self-harm.

Toowoomba Grammar headmaster Dr John Kinniburgh said this research played at major role in developing the SDI between the three single-gender schools, which share numerous families.

“We know about smartphones and the addictive elements of social media in particular, not to mention the wellbeing and mental health implications of negative social media use, (and) we’ve been very concerned about that,” he said.

“The whole initiative came from a desire to try and partner with our families and help them with what we know are challenging conversations at home.

“Because boys want the smartphone, they want access to these things and we have basically said to our families, ‘look we’ll partner with you’.”

Fairholme principal Dr Leigh Hobart said while each school already had phone bans in place, the initiative would empower parents and caregivers to restrict access.

“We have consulted broadly with our families – day and boarding – to navigate an approach that is achievable and supportive, and their response has been incredibly positive,” she said.

“At its foundations, our communities share common values and families who attend across the schools.

“Working together and approaching this initiative as a community, we are giving families the support they need to take a united stance in the delayed provision of smartphones – parents have the confidence to know that, across the board, this is the approach that our whole community has broadly adopted.”

Glennie School principal Emma Lowry said consultation with parents in the months leading up the announcement had revealed a real appetite to change the culture of how children accessed smartphones and new technology.

“We had focus groups, we had surveys and we had information sessions for our parents where 90% of our existing parents strongly supported the initiative and will definitely participate in the initiative – that’s the collective majority,” he said.

“To be honest, I think the pendulum has swung — it’s swung so far that parents are now realising that they need to put boundaries in place and to put restrictions in place, but they don’t necessarily know how to do it when their child would say, ‘well everybody else has a mobile phone’.

“We’ll see how this year goes to then see refinements or enhancements that we can put in place in subsequent years.”

Dr Kinniburgh said not only would the schools consider making it a policy in the future, but could potentially increase the year levels covered by the initiative.

“It could be (an enrolment requirement), why not? I wouldn’t say no, but at the same time we’ll assess and we’ll review after year one with our counterparts and see how it went,” he said.

“If it goes well, we’ll see and it may continue, and it may continue into year eight and year nine.

“Ideally it would be wonderful if other (schools) were to come on board and take on this initiative — we believe there’s real merit that will benefit children.”

Aside from mental health concerns, all three educators said teachers and parents had witnessed the harmful impacts of smartphones on children’s ability to learn and concentrate.

“This is about developing good habits, I think, for young people to be able to develop those skills of deep thinking and to be able to be creative because we have lost some of that,” Ms Lowry said.

“There are many evident benefits for young people by delaying smartphone use including improving attention spans, reducing exposure to toxic online environments and increasing quality sleep,” Dr Hobart added.

Originally published as Toowoomba schools unite in groundbreaking student phone restrictions