Education Ministry comments on prosecutors’ suggestion to prohibit smartphones at schools

As the Ministry explained, the educational institutions of the country may independently take a decision on using smartphones by pupils at schools after discussing all the pros and cons together with the parents. “The decision must not  contradict the schools’ internal regulations and charter,” the officials add.

However, the Ministry emphasizes functionality of such gadgets which can be used as a portable pocket computer for receiving emails, reading documents etc.

Several regional prosecutors and Mayor of Shymkent city Gabidulla Abdrakhimov became the initiators of this issue.

According to prosecutors of Kyzylorda region, the use of smartphones at schools negatively impacts the education process and ‘the most terrible thing is that the pupils have an uncontrolled access to the internet space.’

“106 children of the region turned out to be members of suicide-propagating groups in VKontakte social media, according to regular monitoring results,” Prosecutor Halidulla Daueshov says.

Meanwhile, Kiev School No. 1 located in Nura district of Karaganda region has already banned use of smartphones and other gadgets at school after it received an appropriate letter from the local education department.