[jkaplowitz]

Then maybe the easier solution is for the states to work with Apple and Google to make a “classroom mode” that disables everything except SMS, voice calls, and medical apps, and the presence of which can somehow easily be detected by the teacher in a privacy-preserving way (e.g. checking only the aggregate number of nearby classroom mode phones broadcasting that status over Bluetooth LE).

In the world where that is common, smartphones can still be banned in the classroom except for people with a medical accommodation, and those people would need to set their phones to classroom mode. The teacher would then have an app to alert them if the number of classroom mode broadcasts deviates from what is expected.

If that number of broadcasts is too low, that’s cause for investigation either because someone with an accommodation is using nonmedical apps in class or because someone’s medical monitoring is impaired due to a depleted phone battery. The former case would lead to discipline for using nonmedical apps in class outside the scope of their medical accommodation; the latter case would lead to whatever medical assistance is appropriate.

There would of course be plenty of other considerations to balance anti-abuse measures, convenience, and privacy. But the basic idea would work.