Personal Cellphone Reliance at School?

[Jedrnurse, BSN, RN]

Hello, all.

I work in a private school in which (to put it nicely) the organization blurs the lines between job and personal life. They use walkie-talkies for dismissal coordination, but during the day they rely on staff calling each other (or texting) on our personal cellphones. My office has a landline, and the classrooms do not have phones. Something about this sticks in my craw. (Not helped by the time a teacher called me at home on New Year's Day during the Winter break to ask me a question.)

The icing on the cake was a few months ago when they wanted to eliminate most remaining landlines and have the calls to those numbers diverted to our cellphones via a special app. (That was a hard "no".)

Thoughts?

[AdobeRN]

Nope....I would be OK if the school would provide me a cell phone. But I am not using my personal phone for work business.  What about those staff members on a fixed budget with a bad cell plan? Using all their data/minutes etc for work and no compensation for that....no way. 

[Flare, ASN, BSN]

I agree - if the district wants cell phones used, then they need to provide you one.  Only some very special people have my cell phone number, the rest get my Google voice number.  (And I don't give that out freely either)

[RuralMOSchoolRN, ADN, RN]

I agree.  They need to either give you a work cell phone or prorate your cell plan for the data used during school and reimburse you each month.

[Emmy59]

If you go to the School Nurses page on fb many advise against using your personal cell for work because if there's a lawsuit brought against you your cellphone can be taken as evidence.   

[LikeTheDeadSea, MSN, RN]

My cell phone becomes a brick in half of our school buildings. My cell service doesn't like whatever the building is made out of. I know some of my colleagues have problems, too, while others' work perfectly fine in the same locations. 

[RuralMOSchoolRN, ADN, RN]

I would request a work phone and use the rationale regarding the phone being used as evidence in any possible lawsuits and you don't want your personal phone available for that type of discovery.