Lindsay Barnes recognizes the ringing of cell phones. She hears them during class, echoing in the lecture halls – and she’s not alone.

“I’m sure at least one cell phone rings every class,” said Barnes, freshman in liberal arts and sciences.

“Toward the end of the class, it seems phones begin to ring, especially if class goes over.”

Barnes has a cell phone, but she turns it off or puts it on vibrate before she goes to class.

“I check on who’s calling me,” she said, “but I don’t answer it.”

Barnes said she isn’t irritated by phones ringing in class.

“It’s actually a nice break,” she said.

Despite the proliferation of the devices, Barnes hasn’t seen much of a reaction from her instructors.

“I haven’t heard any professors say anything about it, except one who made a joke about it,” she said.

She was referring to Patrick Gouran, associate professor of music.

“I have to give credit to Kevin Spacey, who, when doing live theater, heard a cell phone ring in the audience and broke character to say, `Tell them we’re busy,'” he said.

Though Gouran and Barnes handle the ringing of cell phones in class with humor, many, including Gouran, believe it’s a discourtesy to students and teachers alike.

Alicia Carriquiry, associate provost of statistics, said cell phone users should be aware of how they are affecting others.

“Students should have a minimum courtesy that once they get to class they turn their cell phones off,” she said. “Holding a conversation in class shows a real lack of consideration for other students and a huge lack of respect for the instructor.”

Cell phone user Alicia Upah, freshman in psychology, said she finds it distracting and annoying to hear cell phones ring in class.

Though she tries to remember to shut her’s off, it has rung in class.

“I don’t think the professor heard it,” she said. “He just kept talking.”

Brian Werner, co-owner of The Wireless Store, 2023 Lincoln Way, said at least 60 percent of his customers are ISU students.

“The first two months of school are definitely our busiest months of the year,” he said. Students purchase the phones to avoid the hassle of sharing their phones with multiple roommates and to call home.

Werner said there are products students can buy, such as flashing batteries, that can alert a user of an incoming call without disturbing others.

Allison Sigmund, freshman in elementary education, has a cell phone that she can put on vibrate when in class so it doesn’t make noise.

She said she doesn’t like to hear phones ringing in class.

“It’s annoying, because you’re trying to concentrate and listen to the professor,” she said.

Sigmund said she’s seen most professors ignore the disruption, but she did hear one professor ask a student to turn off her phone.

Kyle Mullenix, senior in civil engineering, doesn’t have a cell phone and would like teachers to say something to students.

“If the professor specifically addressed that person and said something like, `Please turn your cell phones off,’ I think that might encourage students to be more respectful,” he said.

Others have heard not only the ringing, but conversations.

“It’s really irritating when they go off, especially when people answer them and it’s just small talk like, `Hey, how are you? Whatcha doing?'” said Melanie Fredrick, freshman in apparel merchandising, design and production.

Michelle Wilson, senior in microbiology, said she has a phone because she has a daughter in school and her husband works in Des Moines.

She turns off her phone during class, but Wilson said she had a class last semester in which one student often took calls during class.

“I couldn’t believe it,” she said. “He would leave the class to take a call,” Wilson said.

Though the teacher did not confront the student, Wilson did.

“I said, in this crowd of students outside the class, `What’s so important that you take a call during class?” she said.

“He turned real red and said, `Someone wanted to go to lunch with me.'”