Michael S. Lockett reports:
The Juneau School District is attempting to provide parents, students and school board members more information about a new computer monitoring program that was installed this school year without prior notification.
JSD informed parents via email about Bark — software which monitors for “harmful” content including school shooters, self-harm, pornography and cyber bullying — after it was installed on JSD computers earlier this school year. The program was tested for a few weeks, then went live on Sept. 13. An email was sent out Sept. 15 jointly from Bark and JSD’s IT department after the program was fully brought online.
Read more on Juneau Empire.
Related to the school monitoring issue, Lori Bezahler has an OpEd in The Guardian. Here’s a snippet:
The security technology market is capitalizing on fears about school safety to sell unproven, costly surveillance systems that put students, particularly students of color, at risk. The implications of using an unregulated system of data collection combined with biased and inaccurate surveillance tech on schoolchildren is not only alarming, but frankly dystopian.
Read more on The Guardian.