______________ VALLEY STREAM _____________
HERALD Kent named LIA economist
Benatar to host spring tour
Propel NY Energy invests in LI
Page 11
Page 12
Page 18
VOL. 36 NO. 15
APRIL 10 - 16, 2025
$1.00
High schools invest in trades career program By JUAN LASSO jlasso@liherald.com
Herald file photo
Valley Stream schools are bridging the gap between classroom learning and real-world experience by connecting students with valuable local business internships in hopes of establishing a long-term pipeline.
In the halls of Valley Stream’s high schools, a new norm is taking shape as the district fully embraces trade and technical training, with Lori Rodriguez at the helm as its first-ever work-based learning coordinator. Hired last year by the Valley Stream Central High School District, Rodriguez, 62, has been tasked with a tall order: bridging the gap between classroom instruction and real-world experience for students in the district’s five growing career and technical education programs — medical assisting, certified nursing, automotive, cosmetology, and culinary arts. And she’s wasting no time. “This is my first year in the role, the first time the district has hired someone specifically for this,” Rodriguez said. “And it’s all about creating a more technical career-ready climate — giving students a Continued on page 9
Flagging the major hurdles of Hochul’s phone ban By JUAN LASSO jlasso@liherald.com
Governor Kathy Hochul is moving to curb smartphone use by banning them entirely during school hours to ensure “distraction-free learning.” New York is gearing up to take part in a nationwide experiment to remove what has been labeled a persistent and powerful classroom distraction out of students’ hands. “The mental health of our children, especially middle school and high school is really declining” as a key reason for the ban, said Hochul in a press release.
But cutting off access to the digital world via a device that students are accustomed to having constantly at their fingertips may prove unsettling. According to Jennifer DiMaio, assistant superintendent for cur riculum & instruction, enforcing that task is far easier said than done. DiMaio recalls a recent conversation with students over possible student-friendly ways to enforce the ban. She thought the Yondr lockable pouch, a low-tech device that seals with a magnet and an increasingly popular tool among schools going phoneless could work — or, so she thought, until one
student told her plainly: “Miss just give up. It’s not going to work. We already know how to hack the bags.”
Students outsmart phone restrictions On TikTok, videos amassing thousands, even millions of views, share simple hacks for unlocking school-issued cell phone pouches — from popping them open with a pencil — to using decoys to bypass restrictions. One viral hack video, posted by user Belle Hesse, has garnered 20.1 million views as of April. If students have ways to circumvent them, you have to con-
sider what is the point of investing money in phone storage devices, argued DiMaio. “Nobody’s arguing that cell phones have a lot of negative impacts on kids,” she said. “It’s just that when you task schools with managing (screen time), a lot of issues come up.” Smartphones have become so ubiquitous and ingrained,
educators like DiMaio agree that a student’s focus, mental health, and emotional wellbeing can be shaped as much by what happens on those screens as by what happens off them. Excessive smartphone use is linked to rising rates of anxiety, loneliness, and depression among students. While social Continued on page 10