School District Starts Monitoring Students' Social Media Behavior

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By Emily Price2013-09-25 05:00:24 UTC

One California school district has decided to start monitoring not only what students do while they’re at school, but also what they do on social media while they’re at home.

The Glendale Unified School District in southern California signed an agreement in August with Geo Listening, a startup that searches social media for posts that might signal a potential problem. Geo Listening is capable of finding posts that might indicate things like depression, bullying and hate speech by students or others in the area, and bring them to the attention of school administrators who can determine the best next steps.

The agreement between the Glendale Unified School District and Geo Listening is the first of its kind, with no other school districts currently using the service to monitor students.

The company is only able to view public posts — so protected Facebook and Twitter accounts won’t be reported — a differentiation that the company says means no privacy is actually violated during its data collection process.

Monitoring students may seem a bit like it’s crossing the line, but the school district thinks otherwise. In a recent interview with CNN, the school district superintendent indicated that since its implementation Geo Listening has already been able to point out several troublesome posts, including one by a student who was speaking publicly about committing suicide. According to the district superintendent, that early detection helped save the student’s life.

Should schools monitor activity that happens outside school walls? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

Image: Wikimedia

Topics: Facebook, Social Media, Twitter, US & World