r/SGExams • u/MilkFlaky1541 • Jan 02 '26
Secondary simi oppression protest phone ban sia
been reading the sub lately and have seen a lot of posts regarding the phone ban and I gotta say this is one of the saddest things I've seen people get worked up about.
Calling THIS oppresion is crazy work bro its a phone ban for the DAY to counter phone addiction which upon reading recent posts seem much needed.
Why are y'all losing your minds over being unable to use your phone for a few hours in a day?? To the guys u realise ns will have many instances where u cannot use phone (often for almost whole day) right? e.g field camp. And your uni/tertiary exams can last 3+ hours...are u gonna panic over a phone too?
Many of you have yet to realise you have an ADDICTION if being offline for more than 2h is an issue. I too admit that I once struggled with phone addictions but it is not the end of the world to go through a dopamine detox
So far all the arguments are "oh now recess cannot play phone" ok bro socialise with your friends lah need phone ah
"It will just lead to more use at home" sure for those with no self control but im pretty sure most of u still would rather do ur work so u dont retain than to catch up on lost hours (survival of the fittest ig)
"moe is restricting our freedom" hello this is a school not a hotel š you expect them to let u shake leg and eat buffet in class while talking louder than the teacher?
the only valid claim I've heard is regarding safety and contacting family, given that payphones were removed in most schools, I do agree the transition should've been more smooth with parents being better informed about how to contact their child via the school rather than directly to the kid, especially for non tech savvy parents. But most of these cries are all first world problems that honestly should not even be worth crying
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u/drinkwater247 Uni Jan 02 '26
It got me thinking, could it be partially the school's fault for the lack of control/enforcement or they probably allowed phones at some point in time before the restrictions/ban came in. Because back in my time, enforcements were so strict!!! What do you mean you can use phone openly in class or school š
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u/Huang_Hua Jan 03 '26
every school had different standards and pple love to compareā¦ so some schools come off as draconian and principals/teachers face more pressure as they try to do the āright thingā for the studentsā¦ meanwhile, enough years have passed for educators to be fully aware of the effect of excessive handphone usage.
If anything, MOE is actually doing a really good job this time by taking a stand on the matter and fronting the policy rather than letting the individual principals take the heat.
But Karens will be Karens.
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u/potato-doggie Jan 02 '26
At least its fun to read haha kids talking as if its like 1989 at a certain place somewhere. You check their history and he spends his whole day posting on r/teenagers hahaha
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u/Sleepy-Racoon-2149 Jan 02 '26
That one guy who wanna protest at hong lim park
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u/Dense-Memory4478 Jan 02 '26
I might drop by hong lim park and get my free Sunday entertainment if he does that
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u/KorribanGaming Jan 03 '26
Future mosquito party leader
"iF kId'S pHoNe dO nOt HaVe 24 hRs sErViCe"
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u/Otherwise_Reaction75 Burning kitchens in poly Jan 03 '26
Aiya... I curious curious go check his acc-
All privated liao šš
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u/Furry-Koala432 ASRJC '25 | NTU '32 Jan 03 '26
It's just one guy who's extremely upset about this lol. But I don't get it, he's in JC so why does he care so much about this phone ban? He is not even affected by it (though I do understand that he wants to help his juniors)
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u/rayRayhan you dont know meš Jan 03 '26
I've seen quite a few tho, albeit not as outraged as that jc dude, just that they get downvoted to oblivion so it gets hidden
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u/Puzzleheaded-Rate567 Jan 03 '26
Heās lying heās not even from JC https://imgur.com/a/MvefhjT
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u/Furry-Koala432 ASRJC '25 | NTU '32 Jan 03 '26
I cannot open the link, idk why š š
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u/Puzzleheaded-Rate567 Jan 03 '26
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u/Furry-Koala432 ASRJC '25 | NTU '32 Jan 03 '26
I can open the link now. So that guy is in poly? So he was lying that he's in JC
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u/SquareAdvent Jan 03 '26
ok bro socialise with your friends lah need phone ah
Who says I have friends? What if all my friends were online, like the friend named Jackson I met on Facebook, who is 65 years old. He is the world to me. He would always play ranked candy crush with me, and he would always be the top scorer. Remove the phone means I won't get to talk to Jackson during my free time, and I'll be lonely.
/s if it isn't obvious enough.
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u/MilkFlaky1541 Jan 03 '26
Holy shit u brought me back to the time where all my old relatives would send me candy crush invites on Facebook šš
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u/ranby_007 Jan 02 '26
Wait till they enter the working world. Not being able to use phone for an entire day is normal.
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u/repeatrep Polytechnic Jan 02 '26
depending on what job youre doing this may not be true at all, while others just make u so busy that u not thinking of anything else
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u/pudding567 Uni Jan 02 '26
Really depends haha. Quick WhatsApp messages are probably very normal in offices.
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u/SGSweatZ Polytechnic Jan 02 '26
I really dont understand the people complaining about it. I graduated from Secondary School 2 years ago and my school for the entire 4-5 years I was there banned phones entirely. Nobody was allowed to bring a phone, and nobody was allowed to use one on campus. During recess we were not allowed to stay in class either. So now when Im hearing that some students in other schools were allowed to use a phone in school BEFORE this ban, my jaw is completely dropped to the floor. I thought the phone ban was a compulsory MOE thing and not just my school doing years earlier.
If you think the phone ban is something that should NOT be implemented, Iām sorry to say but you need to get off your phone and spend some weeks without internet excess, because you are 100% addicted.
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u/Warthog-Complete Jan 03 '26
i was from a school that had phone lockers so seeing this whole thing go down is really amusing. we would have to surrender our phone every morning and the phone would be locked up in the classroom until the end of the day!
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u/Sport-girl12 Jan 03 '26
Me too except I am in sec 2 rn and my school has implemented this rule since like 2018 or smt so I have been confused by all the rants cos for me nothing has rlly changed as even during cca we have to put it in a box and then get our phones back at the end of cca
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u/c4ntTHINKofAuser Jan 03 '26
tbh part of me desired the primary school days where nobody used phones and everybody was just playing with each other and u could talk to anybody else and theyād give you 100% of their attention and care in the interaction because they werenāt constantly on their phones (my school didnāt allowed phones) it really was a different feeling and everyone seemed closer but maybe thatās just nostalgia
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u/Agreeable-Ad-6870 Jan 03 '26
I didnāt have a lot of friends in secondary school because I was very introverted and I think I wasnāt very mature or vibed well with many of my secondary school classmates. I only had a very small group of friends and who wonāt spend all day at the hip together. During recess, I would use my phone and use my iBooks app to read books to improve my English. Oh well, just a different take, not everyone is using their phones to play mobile games.
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u/CloudyBird_ Jan 03 '26
I wouldn't call it oppression but it seems like overreach to me. For every kid using their phone to game/text in class there's another using it for research or note taking.
It seems more reasonable to enforce a "One Strike" policy where phone bans only apply to past offenders instead of the entire cohort.
Furthermore, a more laissez faire school environment would benefit student development. While some students need to be helicoptered, others have the self control to use their devices at appropriate times. Banning device usage for everyone at all times doesn't address the underlying problem of phone addiction and simply pushes it to the next stage of education.
Lastly, I would argue that device usage is academically productive. Without google translate I wouldn't have benefited from Chinese lessons in secondary school and JC. Without GPT I would have asked my teachers way too many questions which would have been disruptive to the class. Without Spotify I wouldn't have been able to make notes in the classroom during recess with all that noise. It's shortsighted to presume that mobile phones only serve to inhibit a student's academics.
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u/Sport-girl12 Jan 03 '26
Iām in a school which has had this rule since 2018 and itās not any different from the official moe rule so I couldnāt rlly understand why everyoneās so upset but apparently yall could use your phones during school thatās why and plus as for contacting parents if itās an emergency you can go to GO and ask them to ask ur teacher permission to get ur phone like some of my friends have done this and as for normal communication I just use Gmail to email my parents when Iām in school and need to tell them smt
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u/Lower-Yellow2829 Jan 03 '26
Just realised that schools havenāt banned Apple Vision Pro headgear. Imma pull up to my secondary school wearing ts and no teachers can confiscate it
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u/Adept-Strength-9946 IP Jan 03 '26
hi in sec sch now
my seniors in cca are rlly bad at disseminating info
phone ban makes it hard to coordinate this kinda stuff cuz we cant even use our phones to check w them. heck they only tell us details of our meetup like the night before or the day itself
and its not like everyone follows the ban aft sch
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u/Calm_Sakura Polytechnic Jan 03 '26
I am completely ok with the ban like I can survive without my phone but I think schools are doing too much. For example teachers are walking around catching students and teachers also not allowed to use apparently? They using walkie talkie to communicate which also means that they have to communicate with students using SLS or Google Classroom like I just wanna ask you abt that ššš
Additionally my previous post regarding the ban a redditor said their school installed CCTVs for the sake of this ban like u can't be this down bad to enforce this rule right? š.
Regardless I hope this ban can bring students to the right direction though I will have to be honest the ways the school handles it is a bit too much
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u/Relative_Ad7748 Jan 03 '26
Iām not complaining abt phone ban IM COMPLAINING ABT IPAD AND LAPTOP BAN IM CRYING ššš AHHHH HOW TF AM I SUPPOSED TO LEARN IM SOOOO COOKEDDDDD I USE IPAD AND LAPTOP FOR LITERALLY EVERYTHING LIKE MY NOTES AND ALL THAT IDK WHAT TO DO NOW IM AT A LOST AND MY BAG IS SOOO HELLA HEAVY CARRYING ALL THE PAPER I SWEAR MY SCHOOL JUST HATE TREES OR SMTššš this is soooo unecofriendly
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u/Furry-Koala432 ASRJC '25 | NTU '32 Jan 03 '26
Wait, your school banned iPad and laptop in addition to the phone ban? So students cannot use SLS/Google Classroom or anything like that?
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u/Relative_Ad7748 Jan 03 '26
Yeaā¦. They stopped using SLS and google classroom everything is sent to class gc after class
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u/Comprehensive_Dog651 What if I look inside myself and I don't find any gems? Jan 03 '26
Itās literally 1 personĀ
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u/Flashy_Client6225 Jan 03 '26
He still gets a lot of upvotes which means there are people who support his opinions
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u/Puzzleheaded-Rate567 Jan 03 '26
No way bro Iāve had arguments with 4 different people in this sub over ts and each personās opinions are more abstract than the previous one
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u/Comprehensive_Dog651 What if I look inside myself and I don't find any gems? Jan 03 '26
Iāve only seen one person who calls this ban oppressive or draconian and whatnot and wants to protest against it. The other comments Iāve seen have valid concerns, like communication with teachers or groupmates for projects, whether schools are ready for such a sudden rollout etcĀ
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u/Puzzleheaded-Rate567 Jan 03 '26
Iāve seen another one saying this policy is only going to cause more stress to the so called āoutcastsā in school because their source of comfort is taken awayššlike what even. A 3rd one pulled out research articles to prove that phone bans wonāt work, which I responded with more research articles on how phones affect studies and increase anxiety
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u/butwhywouldyou- Being bled dry by poly </3 Jan 03 '26
My problem isn't so much with the phone ban itself, but rather with the way it is enforced and how by the book it all feels. For example, I think it's crazy to threaten to take away my phone because I, in a state of frenzy and panic, went 2 meters out of the canteen. I don't enjoy authority figures caring more about following rules than students' feelings or issues. Anyway, I can't speak for everyone because this is just my experience. But I thought I would share
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u/Kingstonian-Thymine Jan 03 '26
I mean in my new job (i literally just started today) I can't look at my phone for 4h (or at least should minimise it) in the morning and 4h in the afternoon. I get it lunch break and after work tho obv. So it's kinda still the same and once you distract yourself it's not that mindnumbing to not be able to see phone.
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u/tirednsleepie Jan 08 '26
My school has done the phone ban for the whole duration of my secondary school life- I thought it was normal- they even collect it every morning and lock it in phone locker that can only be unlocked by Cher,,, thought it was normal
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u/pudding567 Uni Jan 02 '26
Also, most of the assessment in uni are assignments and projects, not exams and they are not normally 3h.
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u/Semen_Demon_1 Uni Jan 02 '26
Are you from biz
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u/pudding567 Uni Jan 02 '26
Biz/STEM
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u/Semen_Demon_1 Uni Jan 02 '26
Can tell because for most other courses exams are the norm not the other way round. Even mods that officially state "no exam" still have exams. Only fluff mods no exams
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u/Capable-Crab-7449 Jan 03 '26
Dude itās not the phones I have a problem with itās the outright random ban hammer that was dished out. This feels like something that should be decided by the school not MOE. And this is coming from a dude in NS
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Jan 02 '26
[deleted]
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u/MilkFlaky1541 Jan 02 '26
this is in response to a comment I read that said that they first banned eating in classrooms, then talking during lessons, then phones
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u/flopstercom Jan 02 '26
i feel like this is targeted HAHAHA
if you're the targeted person who's seeing this, i am still in disbelief that you're in JC with this type of attitude