Laptops, Candy, and Spying: Lower Merion High School (PA) Should Try A Little Philanthropy Instead

It’s not like K-12 doesn’t have enough to contend with these days: what with the bashing of public school teachers and curricula across media venues, the rush to try and satisfy (unsuccessfully at a large number of schools) No Child Left Behind testing standards, the hand ringing effects of Diane Ravitch’s turn around, the huge decreases in state funding for public schools in all states, the rumblings about state governments’ challenges to teacher unions and tenure and pay rates and pensions and health benefits. And now this? Administrators at the Lower Merion High School in Lower Merion, Pennsylvania have been “spying” on students through webcams on students’ school-supplied MAC laptops.

Not only that, but the Administration at the school has been viewing videos of students and, in at least one case, asking a student to account for what he was seen doing at home. The school’s position? “Spying” software was installed and activated for the purpose of locating unreturned laptops. Then, why did the Assistant Principal, Lindy Matsko, call Blake Robbins into her office on November 11th, screen shot in hand, to question him about his inappropriate off-school-grounds behavior; apparently, she mistook candy for pills, and as a result, surmised that Blake might be using/selling drugs. That suspicion has nothing at all to do with retrieving unreturned laptops.

In a February 22nd ABC News report, Blake contends that the school violated his privacy; the lesson learned — “never trust any computer that someone gives you.” His parents are also worried that IT folks at the school, two have been suspended (they are on paid leave) since the FBI flew in to investigate, have been peeping in on their daughter and other female students when they are taking showers or changing their clothes. Blake’s parents, who are suing the school, claim that they are not seeking monetary damages, but they do want all of the videos removed from the school server.

Lower Merion Township is a comfortably middle class (as comfortable as a middle class community with average family income over $100,000 can be, these days) suburb of Philadelphia. It’s possible that parents can actually afford to purchase laptops for their kids. So why does this school system bother to spend money in this way (and on MACs that cost three times what PCs cost!); why not, instead, purchase laptops (PCs might just be perfect, besides there’d be more to go around) for students at South Philadelphia High School (webcams deactivated, of course)?