Ethical Analysis Essay
Zachary Joachim
Modern technology struggles to find its niche in contemporary culture. A direct example
of this issue is the debate over use of cell phones in contemporary classroom settings. According
to Deborah R. Tindell in her book "College Teaching", 92% of American college students use
their phones to text during class. Many teachers and parents in opposition to the use of cell
phones in academic settings would point to this as an indicator of their distracting nature. In
contrast however, most students would retort with sentiments similar to that of high school
teacher Meg Ormiston on Teachhub.com, that "learning on cell phones can extend beyond the
walls of the school or the confines of a class period". Cell phones are such an active participant
in our everyday lives that educational administrations have come to accept the inevitability of
their presence in classrooms; therefore, these administrations are now tasked with sorting out
how to maximize their potential to assist in the learning experience while simultaneously
minimizing their distracting tendencies. This paper will explore the ethical perspectives of
Michael Sandel, Slavoj Zizek, Peter Singer and Stephen Asma in regard to how best to integrate
the educational pros and cons of cell phones into the classroom setting.
First, let us explore the endless possibilities presented by the involvement of cell phones
in the collective learning process. Utilitarian Peter Singer suggests in his essay “The Drowning
Child and the Expanding Circle” that humans "should think about how our self-interest can be
expanded to include the interests of everyone." Cell phones are an inherently optimal medium for
self-interest given their ability to provide us with our own virtual worlds. What if those virtual
worlds could be expanded to include classrooms? This has already begun. Students all over the
country use sites such as Yik-Yak to chat during class. Imagine now, if every class a student
enrolled in provided an application similar to Yik-Yak that provided a discussion board,
deadlines, and readings for the course in question. Stephen Asma, an opponent of Singers, would
likewise support this venture as it would render classrooms "tribes" of sorts; small, tight-knit
communities capable of constant interaction, so championed in his essay “The Myth of Universal
Love”. Students would be able to easily communicate with one another 24/7 about the class on a
medium regulated and observed by the teacher and administration. Concepts such as this have
already become popular in some higher level institutions. For example, Virginia Commonwealth
University already employs a “Live Safe” application which all students are encouraged to
download upon their first day of orientation. The application gives students updates on local
crime as well as a quick medium through which to contact the authorities if needed, at any time
of the day. If applied to classrooms, an application such as this could provide similarly useful
updates on class activities, discussions and assignments, taking education “beyond the confines
of the class period” as suggested by Mrs. Ormiston.
Now, cell phones most certainly have their academic drawbacks. Many institutions have
sought to ban their presence in the classroom because when used for their typical social reasons,
they are admittedly quite a distraction. As a college student, this is evident to me in the form of
daily rings and buzzes in the background of lectures that most surely detract from students'
attention spans. In reference to social ideologist Slavoj Zizek in his rant “First as Tragedy, Then
as Farce”, bans on cell phones merely "prolong [the] problem rather than fix [it]." Students are
going to bring their phones to class ban or no ban, and so we must "reframe [the] entire system
so the need for things like [bans] doesn't exist." This is where the issue becomes solely
administrative. It is in the hands of institutions to weigh the current cons and potential pros of
cell phones in the classroom, and it comes down to this; speaking from the perspective of
political philosopher Michael Sandel in his lecture “The Lost Art of Democratic Debate”, "we
need to focus on the essential nature of the activity in question." On surface level, the essential
nature of a classroom is to provide an engaging collective learning experience, and the essential
nature of a cell phone is to provide accessibility and convenience to one’s everyday tasks. These
tendencies naturally contrast, and hence the administrations in question have not proceeded in
developing ways in which we can truly use cell phones to our educational advantage. It is quite
fair to ask how something so obviously distracting in the parameters of its current usage could be
advantageous to the collective learning experience. Many would assert that learning isn’t
supposed to be convenient, but arduous, and therefore cell phones have no place in it. Yet to
many progressive thinkers, convenience in education does not mean a dip in its quality, but an
opportunity for it to excel to never before imagined levels of integration into our everyday lives.
This is the sticking point. A virtue of American education has always been a willingness to
ignore shortcuts and learn through intensive labor because that is how information is best
retained. So how does this work? How is a device designed to provide life with shortcuts
supposed to help us learn?
To further cite Michael Sandel, in order to resolve this quarrel we must apply the lost art
of democratic debate. This so difficult because the issue of cell phone usage in the contemporary
classroom setting is much more than what it appears on surface level. It is not just an argument
over how to balance distractions and opportunities presented by the same medium; it is an
illustration of modern technologies struggle to integrate into fields where similar thought
processes have prevailed for an extended period of time. It is “old world’ versus “new world’
thinking, an ever present dichotomy in the history of humanity. For centuries our species has
struggled to create new ideas and utilize them in our lives while simultaneously maintaining the
virtues of established knowledge. The process of “out with the old, in with the new” is
prevalently dubbed counter intuitive. We cannot loose what we have already gained for the sake
of “advancement”, hence many balk at the concept of drastically altering the structure of an
educational system which has had a hand in making the United States one of the most prosperous
countries in the world. “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it” many would argue. This is why this subject
is so difficult to break down to a form in which it can be decided through democratic debate; it is
just too nuanced.
In conclusion, the perspective of ideologist Zlavoj Zizek may present the beginnings of a
solution. In his before mentioned rant on charity and private property, Zizek shoots down the
concept of a middle ground, asserting that the issue must be allowed to compound itself in order
to gain all information needed to reach polarity, and an educated solution. We are currently
engaging in the debate over cell phones in the classroom in the context of this middle ground.
Cell phones are generally admitted into the collective learning environment, yet in an attempt to
minimize their distracting tendencies we fail to utilize them to their fullest extent. Zizek would
suggest either completely abolishing them in the classroom setting or relinquishing all
regulations and applying every resource possible to developing new ways to integrate them into
the very same classroom setting. He and Sandel would agree that this is the only way to flesh out
the situation; to allow all the pros and all the cons to show themselves in order to engage in a
true, educated democratic debate over the issue, through which we can reach a solution that
balances perspectives such as those of Singer and Asma. A solution that expands modern
education to maximize the interests of all its adherents while maintaining the close knit, tribelike setting of the contemporary classroom.
Works Cited
Sandel, Michael. “The Lost Art of Democratic Debate.” TedTalks (2010). February, 2010.
Zizek, Slavoj. “First as Tragedy Then as Farce.” RSA (2010). July 28, 2010.
Asma, Stephen. “The Myth of Universal Love.” New York Times (2013). January 5, 2013.
Singer, Peter. “The Dorwning Child and the Expanding Circle.” New Internationalist issue 289
(1997). April, 1997.
Tindell, Deborah. “College Teaching.” TandFonline.com volume 60, issue 1 (2012). December
29, 2011.
Ormiston, Meg. “How to Use Cell Phones as Learning Tools.” Teachhub.com Hot Tips and
Topics Blog (2012). January 24, 2012.