IT staff to get help with bullying, search warnings

North Allegheny School District’s information technology staff is spending an inordinate amount of time dealing with online bullying and concerning searches, hampering its ability to deal with issues with the technology.

“It is a significant portion of the day. There are a lot of alerts every single day,” said Richard Platts, director of technology and innovation.

The school board on Feb. 24 approved additional student safety monitoring by Securly at a cost of $3.33 per student, or approximately $28,000 a year. Securly will provide an additional layer of monitoring service, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days per year, he said.

The IT department is “alerted” by several uses on district-owned devices. The alert could be something as simple as “Romeo and Juliet” triggering a suicide search alert to actual cyberbullying. And, with some remote learning, twothirds of the alerts are not triggered during in-school hours.

“This will provide additional help and support for our staff to make sure we can keep our students safe,” he said.

The contract also will provide additional monitoring of GoogleDocs, which sees between 10,000 and 40,000 new files added daily. And it adds monitoring for obscene material and nudity, allowing the district to “intervene before trouble starts.”

The artificial intelligence will be able to distinguish between something to be concerned about and academic research or slang. “If someone emails, ‘I would kill for a Carson Middle School chicken bowl,’ it will understand,” Mr. Platts said.

Any alerts that turn out to be concerning are turned over to the students’ principal or guidance counselor, who then investigates and calls parents if necessary.

Board President Andrew Chomos asked Mr. Platts how many times staff had to go beyond the guidance counselor with “real challenges.”

“Every single week,” Mr. Platts said.

Joseph Sciullo, director of student services, said they are talking about “heavy, heavy items,” such as “hit lists” for sexual harassment.

“We’re talking about some pretty heavy stuff that comes across those monitoring systems. We are talking about students’ well-being, especially during this pandemic,” he said. “This is a tool that is going to tell us what they are doing because they are talking to their computer before they are talking to a person.”

Some board members expressed concerns about student privacy.

“Yes, they are our devices, but it sort of worries me that a majority of the kids are getting this outside of the school day and, being outside of the school day, is it outside of our realm,” said Libby Blackburn.

Marcie Crow said the burden will fall on lower-income students who don’t have their own devices.

“I just personally feel that this is an overreach to go into homes. I understand it’s our property, our server, but I think it is intrusive to our families at times,” she said. “The easiest thing to do is get your own device. … But a number of students can’t afford to have their own device, so they use what the school has. They are no more likely to engage in any behavior than their more privileged counterparts … but those are the students who are going to be monitored 24 hours a day, seven days a week.”

District solicitor Michael Brungo said the district has a legal obligation to intervene in concerning situations.

“If something came to the attention of the district and it was ignored, and child suffered physical or emotional harm, there could be potential liability,” he said. “You’re a government agency. If you were to engage in willful neglect of your duties to report under law … then there could be potential liability for willful neglect in violation of a child’s civil rights.”

The contract passed 8-1 with Mrs. Crow voting no.