Connie Llanos reports: Los Angeles Unified officials hope a new plan allowing students to purchase school meals with a simple press of a finger will save money, speed up long cafeteria lines and reduce the headaches caused by forgotten lunch money. But the controversial finger scan ID system, already tested and dropped by at least…
Category: Youth & Schools
NZ: Teachers get power to search their pupils
Speaking of grooming students for a surveillance state in the name of “safety,” Joanne Carroll and Rachel Grunwell report that New Zealand will let teachers search students: Teachers are to get explicit powers to search children – potentially even strip-search them – for weapons. The Government is to release draft guidelines applying to the classroom, schoolyard…
Judging ourselves and not just the Rutgers students
To follow up on my previous blog entry about Tyler Clementi’s suicide, here are two pointers to some thoughtful discussions of the tragedy: Law professor and privacy scholar and author Dan Solove comments in, The Clementi Suicide and Invasion of Privacy on Concurring Opinions. Journalist and author Jeff Jarvis follows up on an interview he…
TX: Student badges equipped with tracking devices
Tiffany Craig reports: Students in Santa Fe have to wear ID badges to class, complete with a built-in tracking device. The Smart Badge program started this school year, and is getting mixed reviews from parents and students. Patrick Mann is a senior and said he feels like he’s in prison. “Normally, the one people you would…