The first day I started my teaching career, I showed up ready to make a real difference in lives. Staff Development was going to make me feel so professional!

Well, the whole day was spent discussing whether or not we should allow gum chewing in class.

Pros, cons, enforcement, should it be allowed in—say art—but not math, in classes but not in the halls, would the coaches follow the ban in their academic classes, and on and on. Teacher was pitted against teacher. What kind of punishment should gum chewers receive? Licks? Arguments ensued. Nothing else seemed to matter. Gum chewing was THE most important educational topic. Some way chewing or not would be a cure-all to foster motivation, get students into college or get them better jobs, solve past educational weaknesses and win all the games.

At the end of the day, the decision from the administration was to ban all gum, as they had done in past years, even though all recognized that basically it had always been an unenforceable rule.

I went home at the end of the day with my enthusiasm dragging. Was that what education was really all about? I had been a student. I knew that if a rule was made it needed to be enforced; otherwise, it was a farce and made you question the relevance of other rules, too.

In the years since, I have periodically run across rules and laws that were just made because they sounded good, and maybe needed to be made, but were unenforceable, so what was the point of making them a law? I’ve always called them chewing gum laws.

City Council is looking at a no texting law. No texting is a great idea, but how can it be enforced?  Have you seen teens texting lately? They don’t even look at the phone. They can hold the phone in their lap, under the table, by their leg or even text in the dark, without taking their eyes off a movie or while talking to someone else on a completely different topic. If they want to text while driving, they will do it; and policemen will have a very difficult time noticing—until it’s too late and an accident occurs.  A law about fines if there is texting involved in an accident or some other enforceable law would work, but in general, a generic no texting will be very difficult, if not impossible, to enforce. Our local authorities have publicly stated so. Yes, it looks good to say we are behind no texting while driving, but…will this be another chewing gum law? Will it work or is there some other way to convince teens—and adults for that matter—that driving and texting don’t mix? Maybe there’s something that can be done to show Brownfield is behind the concept besides making an unenforceable law a law. Maybe there’s not a solution.

Another conundrum. Well, from me to you, today, take this to heart–please don’t text and drive. And, if you have any suggestions for a solution to the situation, let me know.

Author: GlendaCameron
Author, writer, radio host, and educator Glenda Cameron has been co-host of TownTalk since 2006. In addition, she serves as Media Producer and contributing writer to www.towntalkradio.com. She began her radio career in Littlefield, Texas, at KZZN, later moving to KJAK and KFRE in Lubbock. Glenda’s hobbies include guitar, piano, and scanography.