> Evergreen Public Schools in Washington state, for example, started using the company's service this school year. Between September and mid-March, the system flagged more than 9,000 incidents in the 26,000-student district. The overwhelming majority-84 percent-were for minor violations, such as profanity.
The fact that the system even monitors for profanity at all tells me its purpose has a lot more to do with student surveillance than it does with student safety.
That was exactly my thought. How does finding an assignment with the word "pussy" in it help anyone? (Plus if it's an assignment, wouldn't the teacher eventually see it? WTF?) I just don't get what parents and school administrators think they're achieving with this given the potential harm that can come from it. Were I a parent, I certainly wouldn't want some random person at the school to have access to everything my kid does online. Especially knowing how creepy some of the school administrators I dealt with growing up were!
Having had my 1A rights flagrantly violated by a petty administrator, I wholeheartedly agree. We need to worry about surveilling dysfunctional bureaucrats and their behavior, not students.
I don't nessecarily have an issue with surveillance systems as they act as force multipliers for all sorts of noble causes.
Surveillance systems should strictly be used for physical safety, anti-vandalism, and loss prevention purposes. You're not preparing kids to succeed by micromanaging them from behind a series of monitors. At all. People who intend to use the system to punish the kids for swearing by no means should be allowed access. The teachers and even the principal really shouldn't even have access to reduce the temptation to abuse the surveillance system. If they keep getting access the surveillance system should be thrown in the trash.
Bosses who use similar systems to keep their employees working can also expect nothing better than mediocrity and a widespread CYA mentality.
Every surveillance system will be used to persecute innocent people who the surveillers do not like. Moreover, it has long been argued that surveillance itself is a form of persecution. See Bentham, Foucault etc.
You think these schools and teachers want to educate kids? These people want to just get their salary at the end of the month and eliminate all potential liabilities that could get them in trouble.
They would ban eye contact and speaking to each other, if it would bring them more peace of mind and job security. Kinda like dictators do...
"Eschew flamebait. Don't introduce flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents."
The fact that the system even monitors for profanity at all tells me its purpose has a lot more to do with student surveillance than it does with student safety.