Arizona high school teacher Mitchell Rutherford resigns over students’ cell phone addiction

US News

By Nicolas McEntyre

An Arizona high school teacher blamed his students’ rampant use of their phones in the classroom for his deteriorating mental health, which he said forced him to quit his job.

Mitchell Rutherford, who taught biology at Sahuaro High School in Tucson, Arizona, for more than a decade, says he quit after multiple failed attempts to get his students off their devices caused him to lose his sanity.

“I’ve been struggling with mental health this year primarily due to what I identified as basically phone addiction with students,” Rutherford told KVOA.

The frustrated educator believes phone addiction is due to school closures during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused students to become desocialized.

Rutherford noticed a change in her students last fall before realizing she was working harder than her students.

“This year something changed, and it’s like they’re going numb, they’re just withdrawing from society, they just can’t get rid of it, they can’t put it aside,” he told the outlet.

Rutherford says that in October half of his students were failing his class and told him they didn’t want to be in school or worry about their grades.

“I was starting to think I was the problem,” Rutherford, who says he became increasingly anxious and depressed, told the Wall Street Journal.

Sahuaro High School’s phone policy says they should not be used in class, but teachers must enforce it, according to the outlet.

Rutherford compared the immense use of the telephone to drug addiction.

“Opioids, obviously, are a big problem, cocaine, heroin, all those drugs, alcohol, everything is a big problem, but sugar is even bigger and then phones are even bigger.” he said.

Rutherford bribed digital youth with rewards if they put down their devices in a bid to help his students fight their so-called “addiction.”

“Here’s extra credit, let’s review your screen time, create habits, let’s do a unit on sleep and why sleep is important, and how to reduce phone use for a bedtime routine, and we talk about it every day.” days and we created a basket called telephone jail,” he explained to KVOA.

He even tried taking his nature walking classes and teaching meditation techniques, but to no avail.

“I would go up to the kids and say, ‘Give me your phone,’ and they would grab it, and I would tell them that’s what an alcoholic would do if you tried to take the bottle from them,” he told the WSJ.

Ninety-seven percent of students use their cell phones during school hours, according to a Common Sense Media study last year.

Gov. Kathy Hochul this week called for a ban on children using smartphones at school, proposing that students carry “dumb” phones that can send text messages but don’t have Internet access.

Parents understood Rutherford’s frustration with screen-obsessed teens, but they weren’t thrilled with his departure.

“I kind of agree with him, not really agree with him for resigning, but I agree with the stance he’s taking because he’s not capable of doing his job,” father Chris Anderson told the NBC affiliate.

“I think it’s understandable that I’m frustrated, I have two teenage kids and they’re constantly on the phone, and it’s a huge distraction,” Bernadette Sauced told the outlet.

Rutherford’s last day of teaching was May 23, a day he called bittersweet, but better for him and his family.

“Part of me feels like I’m abandoning these kids. I tell kids to do hard things all the time and now I’m gone? he said. “But I decided I’m going to try something else that won’t completely consume and exhaust me.”

Rutherford hopes to pursue his doctorate in the future.