Does Spying on Laptops Really Prevent High School Suicides?
If your child has a school-issued device, there’s a good chance that school administrators are using it to spy on them. According to a new investigation from The New York Times, almost half of American schoolchildren are subject to surveillance on their school devices designed to track whether they’re at risk for self-harm or suicide.
Federal law requires schools to use content filters on the devices they give kids. However, many popular educational tech companies also offer AI-boosted tools that look at what students are typing and send school administrators alerts if a student displays warning signs of self-harm.Â
Advocates of these programs say they can help schools identify and get help to struggling students. However, students, administrators, and parents at one Missouri school interviewed by Times reporter Ellen Barry said that false alarms were common. Students told Barry about being “flagged for text messages about hunting trips, historical research into the Ku Klux Klan and, in one case, the Oscar Wilde play ‘The Importance of Being Earnest.'” One administrator reported that he arrived at work one day to find 26 alerts stemming from students researching suicide for a class.
Sometimes these false alarms can have severe consequences. One 16-year-old girl and her family said they were woken up in t
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