Mumbai: Have you ever imagined what your day would be like without your cell phone? Difficult? It could have some rewards though.
Mobile phones in classrooms have become quite the new age menace. Backtracking 10 years from today, a teacher would never imagine having to come up with a punishment for students for using their cell phones during a lecture. With constant notifications from Facebook and Whatsapp, students consider ‘being unavailable’ on their phones blasphemous.
Rob Richardson, a computer science junior at Chico State University came up with an innovative solution to this new age problem. He created an app, called ‘Pocket Points’ for iOS users, which rewards students for not using their cell phones in the classroom for a certain amount of time at a stretch.
According to Richardson it's a win-win-win for students, for professors, and for local businesses. He came up with the idea in spring 2013, while the app was launched in September 2014.
Here's how the app works: Students sit down in class, turn on the app, put their phones away, and then start earning points. Once they're done with class, they can take out their phone, swipe the Pocket Points notification to unlock their phone and see how many points they've earned.
The points can then be redeemed for deals at 15 local businesses, including bars and pizza joints.
Students at Penn State and California State University, Chico, have actively started using the app. The app has seen in excess of 1,000 downloads so far.
20 minutes without checking your phone earns one point
For every 20 minutes a phone is left locked while the app is running, students earn one point, but teamwork can speed that process the more students are using the app on campus at the same time, the faster points are paid out. Penn State University says the points can be used in its student bookstore, with 10 points netting users a 15 per cent discount on university-branded apparel, but a number of nearby also offer discounts if you can prove you weren't checking your Facebook feed in class.
Students in India don't yet have an app that allows them these little classroom cheat-codes but are open to the idea of earning brownie points for keeping their phones away.
Surabhi Rao, a second-year student at St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai, said, “It is a great idea for an app. It would be brilliant if the app came to India soon and also if it was made available across different mobile platforms apart from iOS.”
