But not in Selah, Washington.
At least one Selah school is hosting a website that displays the children’s names, homeroom teacher and picture.
As if that isn’t enough, the school also displays the sports practice schedules.
The bus schedules aren’t available, however. Selah School District states: “In the interest of student safety, the Selah School District school bus routes have been removed from our web site.” (1)
The inclusion of student’s names and photographs is in direct violation of the district’s own Internet Publishing Policy (2) which states: (bold print is for emphasis, and is not part of the original document)
All material posted to a SSD web page must:
1) Be appropriate (as related to the goals stated above).
2) Place acceptable demands on computing and network services.
3) Project a positive image of the Selah School District.
4) Protect the safety of students, staff, and their families.
Specific Web Page Guidelines
1) All pages posted must be in compliance with copyright laws.
2) All web pages must be in compliance with District policies and applicable laws, both state
and federal.
3) All pages must have a direct relationship to identified student learning targets or other District
goals.
4) Staff members may only publish student work, names, or photographs in electronic form
inside a Selah School District Web page. Exceptions must be approved in writing by the
District Web Manager*.
5) All materials displayed on a Web page must be approved by a District authorized Web
manager or other designee before being published on the Internet.
6) Parent and student permission forms must be signed prior to publishing the student’s work
(project, essay, art, etc.), identifiable student photograph, or name on the SSD Web Site.
Forms must be filed with the building Web Manager.
7) In grades K-7 no student’s last name may be used, but first name with last initial is
acceptable. In grades 8-12, last names may be used. At all grade levels, parent permission
is required for a name to be displayed.
8 ) Family privacy must be protected. Student work should not reveal home address, home
phone, e-mail address, other family details, or overly personal information.
9) Web pages requiring excessive system resources or network bandwidth or that hamper the
efficient operation of the SSD web site must be shut down or improved.
10) Personal home pages are not to be provided for individual students or staff, especially pages
that are “live” on the Internet or available through the extranet (stored on the Internet server
but completely unlinked). Classroom home pages are permitted.
11) Student e-mail addresses must not be displayed, but e-mail links to the supervising teacher
may be provided on student work pages for external feedback.
Presumably- the children whose images are being hosted on the website have given their consent to have their images and names displayed, as have their parents.
However, the goal of COPPAis supposed to be “enhancing parental involvement in their child’s online activities in order to protect the privacy and safety of children online.” Online is the keyword in that sentence, it’s their ONLINE safety that COPPA is designed to protect. But parents in this situation need to be more concerned with their child’s OFFLINE safety.
COPPA’s policy could however be interpreted to prevent anyone from posting the images and names of children in an identifiable manner. In the context that the children’s images are hosted on the school’s website, this is a violation. Anyone can print a photo of a child, then stand outside the school waiting for little Hannah, Ryan or Xavier to walk out of Mrs Jones’ classroom.
In addition to violating the children’s rights to safety as defined in COPPA, this story brings out the ironic ineffectiveness of the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA), which, upon investigation, doesn’t actually seek to protect the children from predators in the way that one might expect. In fact, it merely prohibits libraries and public schools from getting discounted Internet rates if they don’t block children’s access to pornography.
In a culture where television, popular music, magazine covers in the grocery store, text messages and forwarded emails can ALL expose a child to overtly sexual images, censorship at school can be viewed as a safety precaution, for sure. But allowing everyone else in the community to have access to a child’s identifiable image and personal information is simply unthinkable. There’s nothing stopping the pervert who lives down the street from using this information to victimize a child.
So children are supposed to be completely unaware of the cultural realities of deviant sexual behavior until it happens to them? And the parents just have to sign a permission slip?
It’s not been confirmed that permission slips were actually used in this situation, but that is how the policy is designed to protect children. Not by defending their safety, but by “passing the buck” with a parental consent waiver designed to make sure that the school doesn’t get into legal trouble if a child is killed, raped, molested, kidnapped or bullied as a result of their online exposure.
So what’s a parent to do? Especially when the Washington State Superintendent of Public Instruction’s School Safety Planning Manual seems to be more concerned with the use of the school as an emergency shelter, rather than protecting the safety of children’s bodies, lives and privacy from the schools and administrations whom parents expect would be interested in their safety.
So apparently, there are very little rules that actually govern what sort of protection children should expect from the adults in their lives.
In the end, it’s up to parents to advocate for their children’s safety and privacy.
If you happen to think this is a disgusting violation of a child’s basic right to EXPECT safety from the adults who are responsible for him, please download and print the PROTECT SELAH KIDS letter, and mail it to the addresses listed below.
Selah Intermediate School
Attn:Jim Merz, Principal
1401 W. Fremont Ave.
Selah, Washington 98942
Selah Intermediate School
Attn:Mr Emmons, Assistant Principal
1401 W. Fremont Ave.
Selah, Washington 98942
Selah School District
Attn: Dr Steve Chestnut, Superintendent
105 W. Bartlett
Selah, Washington 98942
Selah School District
Attn: Ken Newkirk, Webmaster
105 W. Bartlett
Selah, Washington 98942
Additionally, you can access the email addresses and phone numbers of SIS personnel by using the School District’s contact list
*District Web Manager- I couldn’t find a reference to anyone whose job title reflected that term, so the Webmaster was included in the addresses listed.
1- Bus Route, Selah School District
3- Federal Trade Commission’s Children’s Online Privacy Policy Act of 1998 COPPA
4- FCC – Children’s Internet Protection Act CIPA
5- OSPI: School Safety Planning Manual