Description:

In May 2022, Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) revised Regulation COG-RA, governing the use of Personal Mobile Devices (PMDs) capable of transmitting voice, video, or text data within school premises. MCPS required schools to review and update or develop school level PMD guidelines in alignment with COG-RA, disseminate the revised guidelines within the community, and publish them on their respective school websites.  This report presents findings on the implementation of COG-RA at the school level, offering a summary of results obtained from a survey conducted with 146 principals (72%) — respondents represented 97 of 136 elementary schools, 33 of 40 middle schools, and 16 of 26 high schools. The report also incorporates data obtained from the examination of school websites to ascertain compliance with the directive to post PMD guidelines.

Recommendations:

1. Emphasize to schools the imperative of strict adherence to the mandate for posting the PMD guidelines on their school websites.
2. Provide clarification on the appropriate use of PMDs during district and classroom assessment and testing.

A response to the recommendations in this report, prepared by the Office of Strategic Initiatives, can be found here.

File Name: Final School Implementation of COG-RA FINAL 2022-2023_ PMD Regulation 2022-2023.pdf (2.6MB PDF)