<p>I totally agree that the facts in the case are vague. Based on my reading of the carefully worded Robbins’ legal complaint my strong suspicions as to what may have actually transpired:</p>
<p>1) The student was not spied on by the school - websites he himself downloaded, or photos he himself took and left on the school owned laptop were the issue. School had access to these photos and did not spy by remote on the kid. School had a clear terms of usage agreement that students and parents both signed and the school was coming down on the student with consequences for violating it. </p>
<p>2) Having nothing to do with what happened to <em>this</em> student, the parents became aware of the rarely used ability the school had to track a missing or lost laptop. Or maybe the parents or kid claimed that the laptop had been stolen and someone else was responsible for those images/downloads and the asst principal was able to prove to them by invoking the lost or stolen protocols that they or the son were not being truthful. School district claims this tracking technology was used exclusively in situations when a laptop was reported missing or stolen - maybe that’s exactly what happened here. </p>
<p>3) Parents did not like the consequences of #1 and are suing solely on the basis of the ability of the school to track the laptop and the fact that it was never made entirely clear to them that this could be done. </p>
<p>Even the potential of 2) to be abused(no evidence it ever was) is an issue to some - so this technology is no longer enabled. But that would not nearly rise to the level that is being discussed - IMO there is a very good chance that things were not at all the way they’ve been portrayed. </p>
<p>The school district has come up with about the lamest explanation you could think of. The superintendent claims that the software/hardware that enabled the school to do this was merely an anti-theft measure, kind of like “Lo-Jack” for a computer, where the remote access to the webcam would be turned on only if a student reported the laptop stolen. Except, dozens of students have come forward reporting that the light indicating camera operation was observed to come on of its “own initiative” at a wide variety of times and when the faculty staffed tech support at the high school was questioned the routine response was that it was “nothing” and the student should not worry about it. </p>
<p>Soozie, I agree with you 101% about the distinction between school related conduct/activities and that which occurs with out any nexus to the school and therefore should be wholly outside of the school’s jurisdiction. In this day and age where school districts are vying for national and state awards and recognition (meaning “money”) for “safe schools” and “safe communities” initiatives, there is a growing trend of attempting to expand the schools’ regulatory reach beyond the campus, school extra-curriculars and school provided transportation to and from. What is so often striking is the sheer arrogance of school officials when confronted about this and the complacency of parents. In this instance, this district is going to have its hands full. The communities that the district and high schools serve are generally very wealthy and include a high percentage of lawyers, doctors and very successful business people who have the resources at their disposal to fund extensive litigation and who vote. Should be an interesting story to follow.</p>
<p>Being from Philly myself, I know the area you mean. My aunt/uncle/cousins lived in Wynnewood. My grandparents lived in Bala Cynwyd. I have advised a student who attended Harriton. My daughter’s current apartment-mate and long time friend went to Lower Merion. </p>
<p>The story is kinda fuzzy right now and so I’d have to hear more facts. Still if the webcam was truly on, that’s not right. And again, I don’t feel schools should have any say in matters students do on their own time at home. However, if there was stuff ON the computer he was doing that was not appropriate, they may have say on that as it is a school computer. But the way the story is written, it comes across as the computer took videos or photos of him.</p>
<p>“Seriously? What do you think the parents were going to accomplish by themselves? Even if they’d managed to get the remote access removed, the parents would never know that, would never know if the school reinstated it more quietly the second time around, and the school would not be held accountable.”</p>
<p>Disagree. IF something inappropriate was done in this case, it was most likely done by some low to mid-level administrator acting stupidly. Do you seriously think that the superintendent and school board need this stuff? That they don’t talk to their lawyers? The administration would certainly want to know, and to take action to make sure that it didn’t happen again.</p>
<p>If the facts are as suggested in post no. 19 (the administration) would know this, I would also instruct my attorneys to defend the suit as aggressively as possible, using every discovery device possible to make the lives of the plaintiffs and their attorneys miserable.</p>
<p>^ “Being from Philly myself, I know the area you mean.”</p>
<p>I knew that! That’ll teach me to post at 2 .am. :)</p>
<p>Yes, I also agree that there is a substantive difference between monitoring websites and downloads versus using the camera to spy on activities in the room where the laptop is situated. Even the former, however, raises some very thorny and disturbing issues where 1) the student is connected to his/her home network at the time, not the school’s, and 2) remote access software is used to access the laptop to monitor usage at home, without any notice to the student and parents, as opposed to checking the computer physically when at school. Anyway you cut it, it has the stench of Orwellian government intrusion. Will be interesting to see what this morning’s Inquirer reports.</p>
Corporations do this all of the time. With my former employer, I had their notebook at home. Every time I signed on to the system I had to agree that I would only use it appropriately. They had software on the system to make sure I did not load unauthorized software on it. They could check my email, my websites, etc if they wanted to. It was their computer. If I wanted to do things not allowed on that computer I had to have my own at home. And BTW - my employment agreement stated that I would not do anything to “disparage the image” of the company - even on my own time. </p>
<p>I bet a whole lot more people have these types of things in their employment contracts than may be aware of it. As a Director I had to deal with the violators.</p>
<p>Big, big difference between private employment, pursuant to an agreement under which the monitoring of computer usage is disclosed, and surreptitious action by a government entity. Even in your situation, if your employer had software that logged your access to private 3rd party email accounts like yahoo or gmail capturing your password or accessing the email itself, as opposed to accessing email downloaded to your laptop, there are significant privacy issues implicated. Your employer could, of course, install software that blocked access to 3rd party email systems and to prohibited websites or which logged the websites to which you navigated, but even that is in the context of private employment where you take the job under those terms.</p>
<p>That’s what I thought when I first learned about this program! It’s the wealthiest school district in the state. It’s not entirely immune from voter pressure to economize, but by and large the residents are deeply committed to having the schools be at the educational forefront. Plus, they were able to tap into federal and state subsidies, and to cut a good deal with Apple. </p>
<p>As the old saying goes: Them that has, gets. Especially them that has sophisticated lawyers. It’s hilarious: while there are certainly some lower-income families in the district (although very, very few at Harriton, the school the plaintiff attends), most of these laptops are in the hands of kids who are using them instead of the laptops they already had, or the laptops they would have gotten for Hanukah or Christmas.</p>
<p>“Laptops are a frequent target for theft in schools and off school property. The security feature was installed to help locate a laptop in the event it was reported lost, missing or stolen so that the laptop could be returned to the student.”</p>
<p>If so, why did they activate WebCam on a computer that was NOT stolen? There were others whose WebCam lights would turn on randomly. Most didn’t know what to make of it. Some heard rumors and covered the camera with a piece of cardboard. It’s been going on for two years. My question is why didn’t they complain sooner? There should be a criminal investigation. Interesting to note that how the opinion turns against the kid and the parents just because it’s a wealthy school district. A little like Wall St couldn’t do wrong?</p>
<p>The outrageous thing about the laptop program is that it is funded by a grant from THE STATE. So in essence Lower Merion is getting extra state aid to the tune of hundreds of dollars per high school student.</p>
<p>“If so, why did they activate WebCam on a computer that was not stolen?”</p>
<p>We don’t know that they did that. Indeed, if post 19 is correct, the complaint does not even allege that the district actually spied on the student at home.</p>
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<p>Let me summarize some blog posts, since they were primary evidence of what was going on:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>An anonymous poster pointed out that the complaint carefully avoided alleging that the webcam was ever used remotely on the plaintiff. The poster claimed (or speculated) that the district saw an inappropriate photo the plaintiff had taken of himself and stored on the laptop’s hard drive in a periodic review the district does of the hard drives, a right clearly spelled out in an agreement with the student. The poster also noted that the complaint does not contain a single specific allegation that the remote webcam capability was ever used other than in connection with retrieving laptops that were reported lost or stolen. I speculated that this commenter knew a lot about the situation, because his reading of the complaint was very accurate, but it would have been practically impossible to pick that up without knowing a lot beforehand.</p></li>
<li><p>The second commentator was a 10th grader at the district’s other high school. She made clear that students, teachers, and parents were aware of and frequently discusses the remote webcam capability, and that they believed the district used it often. This bothered her, although she also believed that the district would not use it when kids were out of school unless they had probable cause to believe the computer was being used for something bad. In this case, she thought based on what friends of the plaintiff had told her that the plaintiff had been caught smoking weed, and also using the school’s computer to download porn. She thought the situation here was not inappropriate, and that the plaintiffs and their lawyers were just out for money.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>You can’t make a loaded gun available to staff and then, a la Casa Blanca be “shocked” when it is fired. The focus needs to be on preventing the FIRST violation, not remedial steps.</p>
<p>Pretty safe bet the actual facts will be different than early reports – but whether better or worse for the school who knows. It will be interesting to see if the school’s computer log records mysteriously disappear … </p>
<p>@#18</p>
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<p>And delivering a whupping to the Man just might get you into Harvard :)</p>
<p>My understanding of the school board policy was that the webcam was to be activated remotely only in the event that the laptop itself was reported lost or stolen. That seems to me to be a plausible precaution. If someone violated the policy, that person should be fired.</p>