A smart phone probably isn’t completely necessary, but I would suggest some means of communication. I did a boarding program over the summer a couple times and being able to contact family and friends from afar was a necessity for me.
LOL @skieurope . My book about Ninja Parenting will be published soon. 
It was that story that made me cower. Thanks for resurrecting, @skieurope.
I’m starting to feel like a monster… LOL. Yeah- thanks for resurrecting, @skieurope … ?
@photographermom Don’t worry… you aren’t the only “mean” parent here… just ask my kid. 
Come to think of it, my mom was pretty heroic in meanness too.
I wonder how I ended up a wimpy Casper mom. (No effect on real people. ghostly. hovers around in vain.)
I keep offering DS1 at local school a real (smart) phone and he does not want one as he is fine with Ipod/Ipad over WiFi.
His 2nd phone (during last 7 years, he lost a flip phone) is old and no longer available for purchase, a 2G, and we recharge it for $20 every 90 days (that kind of prepaid plan (7 years old) is no longer offered)
So it costs less than $7 per month and he has over $70 in balance since the phone is mostly off.
My youngest daughter is going to BS in September. My older children went to the local school. During revisit day, in one of the classes that I visited the students were using their smart phones to do an interactive exercise which was being displayed on the smart board as well as their responses. If one of them did not have a smart phone they would not have been able to participate.
What I can say about the no response issue is that my DS did that when he went to college. I did what a bad mother would do. I checked with my provider to make sure he was still alive and the phone was in service. It was still in service because he was calling and texting his friends. I had previously had him authorized as a Manager so that he would not need me to come to campus to take him to the cell phone store if his phone became disabled somehow, I went online, removed him as an authorized manager and proceeded to suspend his service. It was not long before I got a call from a strange phone number. May I add that he was very polite. We were able to have a nice long conversation and he got the point.
Now I know that some parents would believe that this was just an awful thing to do. Suppose there was an emergency? If there was an emergency he could borrow a phone the same way he did to call me when he realized that I turned his phone off. Bottom line, the person who pays the bill has the right to speak to you, be responded to more so than any of your friends. I have never regretted it and my daughter who will be going off to BS in September has been warned.
@Sarrip, you go girl!
@Sarrip, An App can do that.
https://ignorenomoreapp.com/
@SculptorDad : Wow, didn’t know this existed. Thanks
@Sarrip - funny story! Thanks for sharing!
Why do kids need smart phones and an iPad?
You mean if the school requires an iPad? Well, talking on an iPad is a bit of a pain. (Just because kids don’t talk to the parents on their cell does not mean they don’t use it to talk at all. 
)
@skieurope. Ok ok I am a dinosaur 