Dearborn schools tighten controls on Google third‑party apps, offer parent opt‑out

At the Dearborn City School District board meeting on March 10, district technology staff outlined how the district is restricting student access to third‑party Google applications and said families will be able to opt out of certain apps while retaining core Google Classroom services.

Bob Ady, the district’s Director of Instructional Technology, and Chris Kenneberg, supervisor of networks, told trustees the district limits online access on school networks and Chromebooks to educationally approved tools and uses multiple layers of filtering. Ady said the district’s approach is designed to align technology use with curriculum requirements such as the Michigan Computer Science standards and the district’s MiTech guidance.

"We only allow the educationally relevant websites and tools that we use that are approved by the curriculum department," Ady said. Kenneberg described the technical controls: "In order to meet CIPA compliance, we deploy what's called DNS filtering, districtwide," he said, adding that Chromebooks that go home have additional URL‑level filters.

Ady listed examples of third‑party Google apps affected by the change, including YouTube, Google News, Google Earth, Google Translate and Google Maps. He said the district has a process to review and approve videos and other content used in instruction. If families opt out of third‑party apps, Ady said teachers can still demonstrate materials from their own accounts but students who are opted out will not have direct access to those supplemental apps.

Trustees raised concerns about safety, privacy and instructional equity. Trustee Berry asked how the district can assure parents that restricted services are safe. "I'm just scared — this is scary stuff," Berry said, describing worries about data collection and inappropriate content. Ady and Kenneberg responded that district filtering, a firewall and manual review of approved videos reduce risk, and that core Google services such as Gmail (within district limits), Docs, Sheets and Classroom remain available to students.

Trustee Paliszka urged the district to consider whether curriculum could be redesigned to rely less on third‑party apps so families who opt out are not educationally disadvantaged. Ady said he would bring the question to the district’s instructional cabinet for further review. Dr. Michael and other administrators defended a conservative cybersecurity stance, noting past incidents in other districts and district efforts such as two‑factor authentication and other blocking measures.

Another trustee (identified in the transcript as Joshua Jami) said the district must balance protecting student data with teaching students to use technology responsibly; he also emphasized having clear legal terms for how vendors use district data. Kenneberg and Ady said the district limits the student information shared with vendors to the bare minimum needed for instruction — for example, student name, student ID and district email — and does not provide Social Security numbers.

District staff said they will make the opt‑out option part of the student enrollment process going forward and will maintain an annual sign‑off similar to the photography waiver. They also said they will continue reviewing which third‑party tools are instructional necessities and which can be restricted or replaced.

The board did not take a formal vote on new policy during the meeting; trustees asked staff for follow‑up information and additional discussion at future meetings.