Big Brother Is Watching School Kids
This week in “what were they thinking?!” news, a Philadelphia parent filed a lawsuit against his son’s school district after students were given laptops–which were apparently outfitted with webcams used to secretly spy on them both at school and at home.
The case, Blake J. Robbins v. Lower Merion School District, was filed after one of the school’s vice principals disciplined Robbins’ son for “improper behavior in his home,” using a photo taken from the camera as evidence, according to the filing.
There are so many things wrong with this situation, it’s hard to know where to begin. Most obviously, there are some disturbing 1984 “Big Brother” similarities at play here. Is the school district really so out of touch and unable to properly control its students that they must resort to privacy invasion in order to know what’s going on in the hallways? The best way to keep schools orderly and safe is to work towards a mutual trust between students and faculty. Yes, students should be held accountable for bad behavior, but so should teachers and administrators. It’s difficult to think of a quicker way to alienate, humiliate, and lose the trust of students than to spy on them.
Additionally, this webcam abuse does not only affect students. It could violate parents’ privacy, as well as anyone who may have stepped in front of the camera, never expecting that someone could be watching or taking photos. In fact, according to the suit, photos from the webcams “may consist of minors and their parents or friends in compromising or embarrassing positions … [and] various stages of undress.”
Even putting aside the fact that school administrators have clearly been watching too many James Bond movies, what is the vice principal doing punishing a student for bad behavior in his own home? Once students leave school grounds, they are outside of the school’s jurisdiction. Isn’t it the parent’s job to monitor his child at home? A vice principal has no business deciding what actions are “improper” in other people’s homes. It’s hard not to wonder what this student was doing in his personal time that was deemed inappropriate and worthy of punishment at school.
Sure, technology has done a lot of good in our world, but, as this outrageous incident shows, there are also endless opportunities for abuse. What could the school board have possibly been thinking when they decided that spying on their students was a good idea? There is absolutely no excuse. —Shea Connelly
