(gentle upbeat music) - [Michelle] Tonight, what to do about cell phones in Rhode Island's classrooms.

- Even though we had a no cell phone policy, teachers were having a really difficult time enforcing it.

- [Pamela] Then his work is all around us.

Big public art and the evolution of the man who made it.

- There's a way to be a bit of a philosopher, a craftsperson, a designer, an engineer, and then a maker.

- And Ted Nesi unpacks US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg's Washington Bridge visit.

(upbeat lighthearted music) Good evening and welcome to Rhode Island PBS Weekly.

I'm Michelle San Miguel.

- And I'm Pamela Watts.

We begin tonight with the debate over smartphones in schools.

Roughly two-thirds of US schools say they ban the devices for non-academic use, according to national surveys.

- But that high number can be misleading.

All too often, students do not follow the rules and teachers struggle to enforce them.

As more and more schools around the country look to ban or severely limit students' use of phones, contributor Steph Machado reports on how some schools here in Rhode Island are taking on the issue.

(students chatting) - [Steph] If something looks off about this hallway full of teenagers in 2024, it's that not one of them is looking down at a phone.

(bell ringing) At Central Falls High School in Rhode Island's tiniest city in the urban core, an experiment has been underway since October 1st.

- Life at this school changed forever on that day.

- [Steph] That's when the school fully banned cell phones and other personal electronics, like headphones and smartwatches, requiring students lock the devices in these pouches from the company Yondr for the entire school day.

- So I can't get in here.

- Yeah, you can only open it with- - Testing it out.

- With a magnet.

- [Steph] The pouches unlock with these devices, held by staff and also mounted on walls at the end of the school day.

Dr. Deloris Davis Grant, a longtime English and drama teacher, says this was necessary.

- Cell phones were the scourge of this building.

They were such a problem!

You'd have students texting underneath the desk, asking to go to the bathroom, but really, they're going to make phone calls.

Bosses calling them to tell them their work schedule.

Parents calling.

- Even though we had a no cell phone policy, teachers were having a really difficult time enforcing it.

- [Steph] There were several problems Principal Bob McCarthy says that led school leaders to contemplate a new cell phone policy.

- I think one is the distraction in terms of learning and then also, we found a lot of conflicts generated through kids texting or using social media to generate, you know, somebody said somebody about something.

Oh, let's meet in the bathroom.

We'll resolve this.

- After the pandemic, it was awful because they were so used to being on the phone every hour.

- [Steph] Plenty of schools don't let students on their phone during class, but Central Falls went a step further.

The devices are banned even in the hallways and the lunchroom.

- We did allow cell phones in the lunchroom before this policy, but from a logistical standpoint, for kids to come in to unlock their pouches for 20 minutes, then to lock them, we knew that there would be problems where kids would not.

- [Steph] We visited the cafeteria recently and found students actually talking to each other.

That included Pedro Gomez De Aza, who says, at first, he wasn't so sure about locking up his phone.

- I was like, no way I'm doing that.

Putting my phone away for the whole day.

I was like, what if I have an emergency or what if I just don't want to put my phone on the pouch and just have it on me?

- [Steph] But about five months into the total cell phone ban, he's come around.

- It's been good for me because putting my phone away in school has taught me to put my phone away outside of school.

Before, I would just sit in a class and be on my phone and now, not having my phone on me has taught me to find any sort of productive thing to do.

- [Steph] The stakes are high to get things right at Central Falls High School, which has a low graduation rate and some of the lowest English and math test scores in the state.

97% of the students are economically disadvantaged, according to the Rhode Island Department of Education, and more than half are English language learners.

Many students have jobs outside of school, something else that can distract them from class.

- What we say, and I know it kind of sounds cheesy, but your work right now is here at school.

That's your job.

- It put me in a precarious situation when they would say, "My boss is gonna call.

Is it okay if I take the phone call?"

What am I gonna say?

- [Steph] Students do have access to technology during the day in Central Falls, The school provides Chromebooks, one for each student, which they can use for assignments or research.

- You need to write this in your notes 'cause this is gonna come into play.

Can an ordinary man do that?

- [Students] No.

- [Steph] Dr. Grant says she's seen a huge difference since the personal electronics went away.

- The students in my classes all got higher grades.

I feel like they were more communicative, looking me straight in the eye, talking with other students.

I heard the chatter out in the hallways of students talking to each other, communicating in a lively manner.

I really enjoyed that.

That's one of the things that changed.

- [Steph] The Yondr pouches are starting to catch on with middle schools in Providence also using them, but they're not for everyone.

Just one town over from Central Falls in Lincoln, Assistant Superintendent Kevin McNamara doesn't support a total cell phone ban.

- I don't think that models what happens in the real world.

I think if you look at adults, adults need to learn to manage their cell phones, whether they're in a workplace environment, whether they're working with their families.

- [Steph] Before McNamara was Assistant Superintendent, he was principal of Lincoln High School.

He implemented a more permissive cell phone policy in 2013 that's still in effect today.

- We moved to make possessing a cell phone or using a a cell phone outside of class time something that we weren't going to punish and I think one of the things that that did was it gave kids that modicum of responsibility and freedom that they really value.

And for the most part, kids are gonna follow the rules and kids are gonna rise to the level of expectations that adults have for them.

So I've never regretted that decision as a school administrator.

- [Steph] Under the policy, students can use their phones in the hallways or at lunch, but in class, they go in these caddies at the front of the room.

McNamara is not a fan of locking the phones up in case of emergency.

- I think at that point, a cell phone in the hand of a student in a classroom could provide valuable information that would be very helpful to first responders.

- [Steph] Principal McCarthy says that was part of the pushback to the policy in Central Falls.

- A lot of times, that type of communication could be detrimental to a school or community that's in lockdown.

We want to be able to control the information, not because we don't want people to know what's going to happen, but we don't want rumors spreading and we want one source of information happening.

- [Steph] Parents who need to reach their child in an emergency can call the school, McCarthy says, and there are exceptions for students with certain medical conditions.

- One of the things that we were worried about was the notion of addiction.

And so, we spent some time with our mental health support staff planning for what do we do for students when we enact this on October 1st who literally are addicted to their phones?

And we found, which I thought was really nice, is that we didn't have that many issues.

The kids were able to adjust.

- Do you see teenagers getting addicted to their smartphones?

- When we think about addiction, it becomes a very clinical term.

- [Steph] Dr. Tanuja Gandhi is a child psychiatrist at Bradley Hospital in East Providence.

Dr. Gandhi has researched the effects of teen smartphone use.

- It becomes addictive in a sense where you have difficulty cutting down on the time you're spending on that kind of device or digital media content or social media website.

It's harder and harder to not wait to see how many people have liked your picture or who's commenting on your blog or which friend of yours has gotten this new dress.

And I think the behavior around engaging in social media seems more and more addictive.

- [Steph] Dr. Gandhi says the ages of 10 to 19 are critical for brain development and there's a growing body of evidence tying social media use to anxiety and depression in teens.

- We do know that you have to provide robust learning experiences and a rich environment for a child to grow and learn different skills during that age.

If children are spending a lot of time on social media or on their phones or on just any kind of digital platform, does it take away from the time they could be spending learning?

That's one of the questions we have.

There isn't enough evidence to say, you know, there's going to be a long-term impact because we don't have data to indicate that there's like, this impact in like, 40, 50 years.

- [Steph] In Central Falls, this experiment is still new.

The school district spent $27,000 to buy Yondr pouches for the high school and middle school, but there aren't ongoing costs to keep it going.

Principal McCarthy says students will always find a way to get around the rules.

- There are ways that kids know how to undo their pouch.

You can go on YouTube and figure out how to do that fairly quickly.

But the pouch is almost symbolic of the notion of the habit or the expectation that it's more important that the phones are away, but we do need to use the pouches to basically reinforce that.

- [Steph] And Pedro Gomez says plenty of students are still not on board.

- My friends were like, hell no.

I'm not putting my phone in the pouch.

- Have they come around?

- I don't think so.

(laughs) - [Steph] But all laughter aside, Pedro offers some serious advice for his peers.

- For the students that think that being on your phone all day is gonna get you anywhere, there's a lot more to life than just sitting on your phone and you're not gonna find out if you just keep scrolling.

- Pamela, it's an interesting debate.

I mean, could you imagine if here at work we were told, "Sorry, put away those cell phones."

- We'd be lost without them.

Well, up next, you can find all sorts of public art, murals, mosaics, memorials throughout Rhode Island.

Tonight, we focus on the diverse works of local sculptor Peter Diepenbrock, who crafted something you can't help but see every time you drive along one of the busiest highways in the state.

(cars driving) Time flies for tens of thousands of drivers who travel every day on Route 95 in Providence.

You can't miss the mischievous worker about to roll a clock right off the roof of the former Brown and Sharp manufacturing company.

Foundry Clock Man is just one of the whimsical works of modern metal art, created by contemporary sculptor, Peter Diepenbrock.

- The sort of metaphor of it is why is time so dominating in our lives?

Time is totally dominating.

You think about how we are obsessed with time of day, seasons.

You know, retirement.

There's all these ways of, you know, dividing life up into time chunks.

It's a rejection of that.

(machine whirring) - [Pamela] Diepenbrock constructs most of his stainless steel pieces here in his home studio in Jamestown.

(machine whirring) His is a curiosity shop of fanciful, quirky objects, handcrafted items, as well as many maquettes, artist preliminary models, early editions of his signature time piece included.

Diepenbrock says a friend encouraged him to lean the clock visually.

- With the 12 being at the one o'clock position, just sort of to further emphasize that it's going off the building.

- [Pamela] Diepenbrock says his eye-catching icon is also a tip of the cap, paying tribute to Rhode Island factory workers whose lives were spent clocking in and out.

Like those laborers, Diepenbrock says, his designs are driven by manipulating materials and fabricating them.

- It's the breadth of all that stuff that maybe makes what I do a little bit more unique.

- [Pamela] Unique and playful.

Diepenbrock's recent piece of public art is an almost 10 foot tall rabbit springing to life at the playground on Peace Dale's Village Green.

It was commissioned to commemorate South Kingstown's 300th anniversary.

- The gesture is sort of a skating kind of flying bunny, which is sort of inspiring, hopefully, to young people to kind of live lightly in your own life.

- [Pamela] The sculpture is comprised of some 4,000 pieces of metal, fitted together in organic form.

It's called "Ostara," translation, a celebration of new beginnings.

- Life is so serious right now.

The world is in such crisis, it seems like, everywhere you look, that we could use a little more humor and a little less dark subject matter.

(machine whirring) - [Pamela] When it comes to his artwork, Diepenbrock says repeating metal patterns and shapes is one signature of his industrial design.

Constructing these structures has allowed him to be the architect of his own career.

- There's a way to be a bit of a philosopher, a crafts person, a designer, an engineer, right?

And then a maker.

At the core of it is I love making stuff and so it's kind of like, well, what could I make today?

- [Pamela] A native Californian, Diepenbrock discovered that love of making stuff in his father's workshop at age five and continued here in the ocean state when he graduated from Rhode Island School of Design, RISD, in the mid-'80s.

He has been successfully self-employed ever since.

Diepenbrock started in a studio in the old Foundry, building furniture and making sculpture out of recycled material.

Then he scaled down, transitioning to a cottage industry of small metal art, pewter, and cast bronze in what's known as tabletop giftware.

All have humorous personalities, like the dino bite bottle opener.

- Letter opener, candlestick, picture frame, salad servers, centerpieces.

So they all had a function and they were for the most part one piece products.

- [Pamela] And this product by Diepenbrock was used as a prop in the movie plot of "Men in Black."

(character speaking in foreign language) - [Pamela] But in 2002, Diepenbrock's art took a serious turn.

- A friend stopped by and said, "Peter, do you know about the 9/11 memorial competition?"

And I applied to that and won the competition and that is what started the public art practice.

- [Pamela] As you first enter the Rhode Island State House, you passed by Diepenbrock's prestigious commission.

He had only five months to design, create, and install this solemn 9/11 memorial.

It's gold leaf on glass, stark and steeped in symbolism.

- The reference was so 9/11.

So there's nine layers of glass and then the 11 is represented by what looks like the towers, but if you just see them graphically, a 9/11 is embedded three dimensionally.

It was gonna weigh 4,000 pounds and they had to reinforce the structure of the state house from below.

So they had to hire a state, you know, fabricator to come in and build a whole steel armature down below.

It was intense.

I mean, I can't even tell you how intense it was.

- [Pamela] The only project he says may have been more intense?

Getting clock man raised up and bolted down above the Providence skyline.

- This one was 14 holes through brick and granite that had to line up with templates that were gonna be cut out a three quarter inch steel in another state and the parts had to come together and fit.

(bell ringing) - [Pamela] Another of Diepenbrock's heavy metal sculptures can be found on the University of Rhode Island campus.

Torsion III twists like the curl of an ocean wave.

This commission is part of the 1% for public art program, which mandates a portion of all state funding for construction be spent on artwork to create an atmosphere of beauty and citizen pride.

This 14 foot sculpture was installed outside Lipid Hall after an extensive renovation.

Diepenbrock says the accessibility of public art is vital to a community.

- As an artist, it's great to have a work in a museum, but to have it out in the public environment is so much better for the general audience 'cause everybody can see it for free.

It's not intentional to have to go in to see the artwork and so it should enhance the site, make the site more interesting, and it usually provides an opportunity to express some symbolism, some values.

- [Pamela] One of Diepenbrock's recent works is drawing public's eyes in a new direction.

This aerial mobile is the centerpiece of the lobby at Hasbro Children's Hospital.

He calls it abstract construction.

- There's 160 discs of glass, dichroic glass.

There are four sizes and four colors and they shift their color, depending on your view, your angle view.

So the idea was to kind of create this arrangement of floating discs of glass and color that would turn and project those colors all around the room in slow motion.

- Like a rainbow.

- Yeah, or a disco ball, but a little less jazzy.

And the idea being, recognizing that it's a high stress environment, right?

So kids are coming in, they're scared, you know?

Their parents are coming in nervous.

The staff, highly stressed environment.

So I was thinking we need to create something that is calming, that is soothing.

If there's a metaphor there, it would be what would healing look like?

- [Pamela] These days, Diepenbrock says his industrial art concepts aren't so much evolution as experimentation.

- What am I doing?

Well, I'm in my tinker-thinker mode.

- He's been trying his hand at plexiglass kinetics.

How a piece revolves, has motion, movement, and balance.

A work in progress.

- Yeah, I don't think it's working.

(Peter and Pamela laughing) - [Pamela] Outside Diepenbrock's studio are sculptures privately commissioned or just freeform pieces for his own enjoyment, each with a story that can bring a community together and Diepenbrock hopes will surround them for a very long time.

- What I do love about public art as a category is it demands the whole spectrum.

So you have to be able to write about it, you have to be able to speak about it, you have to be able to represent it and model.

You have to transition it, you have to translate it, engineer it, actually build it, deliver it as a complete piece that's gonna last for a couple hundred years.

- Peter Diepenbrock's sculptures and public artworks can also be found in Massachusetts, California, Ohio, and even Panama.

Finally tonight, in this week's episode of Weekly Insight, Michelle and WPRI 12's politics editor Ted Nesi talk about what's next for the Washington Bridge after Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg visited the state.

- Ted, it's good to have you back.

I know the last few months, we've joked that the Weekly Insight segment should be renamed The Washington Bridge Update, but it's finally official.

The Washington Bridge westbound will have to be demolished and ultimately replaced.

- Yeah, and you know, as much as we've been telegraphing this was probably coming, Michelle, it's really striking how far we've come from those early weeks when they said we found the problem, we can repair it quickly, it'll be reopened in three months.

Now, we're talking about demolishing the whole bridge and building a new one.

- State Transportation Director Peter Alviti estimates that the cost to rebuild this bridge will be between 250 and $300 million.

He cautions, look, this is an estimate.

It could be more, but this will be paid for by state funds and also federal funds, a combination.

- Yeah and we expect a majority federal funds.

But, you know, I think it's important to stress, as you alluded to there, Michelle, that these are very, very heavily caveated estimates of how long it will take to build the bridge and how much it will cost because nobody's actually gonna do any construction has laid eyes on the bridge and the plans yet.

This was from the engineers who looked at the problems with the bridge and it'll be until probably July before bidders have come back, said how much they think it will cost and how long they think it will take to do the bridge.

That's when we'll probably start to get some firmer numbers.

- So what that caveat in mind, Alviti is saying that they expect the bridge to be completed by March of 2026 to September of 2026.

Of course, the timing is interesting because we know September of 2026, we have a gubernatorial primary, and so, of course, Dan McKee is up for reelection.

So, you know, you wonder about the timing.

- You can't take the politics out of politics, Michelle, right?

And we know how frustrated many voters are, especially those who live in the Washington Bridge zone on either side of Providence and East Providence.

East Providence can be kind of a swing area in Democratic primaries and so I think, you know, a lot will depend.

It's obvious to say, but does this project go smoothly and quickly and maybe people's memories fade of the frustrations they felt initially?

Or do they run into hurdles?

And this is something Dan McKee is struggling with, all the way up to that primary.

- Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was recently in town visiting the bridge.

You had a chance to press him one-on-one about the tens of millions of dollars, Ted, that have already been spent on repairing the bridge.

Of course, we now know we're looking at rebuilding the bridge.

Let's take a listen to that conversation.

- $37 million was spent rebuilding the deck of this bridge, even though it turns out that the inspections had not been enough to make clear that this bridge was not gonna survive and it shouldn't have been repaired.

It should have been rebuilt.

You know, should us DOT be that blase about that amount of federal money being lost on a project that should have been rebuilt from the start?

- My point is that I never believe that investing in repairing critical infrastructure is a waste of money.

But, of course, if DOT had known that this bridge would need to be torn down, there would've been a different plan.

But we don't enter into these situations with perfect information, especially a bridge like this that was built with a unique design, possibly the only one of its kind in the country, which turns out that it was uniquely disguising some of the issues that were on the inside.

- Ted, that doesn't sound like Secretary Buttigieg, at least right now, is holding anyone accountable for this.

- No, not really.

And I think, you know, of course he's trying to keep all the stakeholders happy up here.

You know, federal-state relations and all that.

But I think that's really the next shoe to drop here, Michelle, along with, as we talked about, getting more official cost estimates and timing estimates.

It's accountability.

The governor in the news conference signaled he was calling for, "A day of reckoning" for those who have responsibility for the bridge.

But if you listen closely, he was talking about litigation and lawyers and it sounds like he's gonna be focused heavily on the contractors who inspected the bridge and were doing the work on the bridge as opposed to DOT itself.

- Right, but who oversees those contracts?

- Well, and I think that's gonna be the tension, right, Michelle?

Is okay, yes, the contractors maybe didn't get everything right, but should someone have had the oversight to know that that was happening and where does the buck really stop?

I think that's what's gonna be the storyline coming up.

- Right, who in state government should be held accountable.

- Exactly.

- Thank you so much, Ted.

I appreciate it.

- Good to be here.

- And that's our broadcast this evening.

I'm Pamela Watts.

- And I'm Michelle San Miguel.

We'll be back next week with another edition of Rhode Island PBS Weekly.

Until then, please follow us on Facebook and X and visit us online to see all of our stories and past episodes at ripbs.org/weekly.

Or listen to our podcast on your favorite streaming platform.

Goodnight.

(gentle upbeat music) (gentle upbeat music continues)