Canyons board directs tighter Chromebook controls after weeks of parent complaints

The Canyons Board of Education on March 18 directed district staff to take immediate steps to limit unmonitored Chromebook use after more than a dozen parents and teachers told the board that students can reach inappropriate material and that classroom Chromebooks often enable distraction.

Parents and staff told the board during the meeting’s patron comment period that students at multiple grade levels had reached sexually explicit content, gaming and streaming websites, or used Chromebooks to bypass instruction. Brynn Whitchurch, a parent, said her family had set the district’s highest restriction level but still found pornographic material on school devices. "Even with that highest restriction level, they have been able to access very questionable material on their Chromebooks," Whitchurch said.

Liz Jenkins, a parent active in school groups, urged an allow-list (white list) approach and recommended district-provided parent-monitoring tools such as Bark, Securly or GoGuardian. "Better filtering is needed at all age groups," Jenkins said, adding that the district-issued login prevents many third‑party parental monitoring tools from working on school-managed accounts. Courtney Wimberley, who identified herself as a Canyon School District teacher, urged stronger paid parental leave for staff but also described Chromebook problems at school and called for policy change.

Superintendent Rick Robbins acknowledged the problem and told the board that filtering systems are imperfect. "There is no infallible system," Robbins said. He reviewed usage data showing median daily Chromebook minutes of about 31 minutes in elementary, and higher averages in middle and high school, and described the work the district’s IT staff has done reviewing flagged sites and parent reports. IT staff (Scott) explained that filtering works differently on district devices and networks than on private home networks: when a student uses a district device on district Wi‑Fi it is filtered, but a student logging in on a private device or hotspot is not filtered by district systems.

After discussion the board gave administration the following directions as immediate actions: - Define and restrict "free use" of Chromebooks in classrooms so devices are used only for teacher-directed learning during the school day (elementary schools prioritized first). Outcome: administrative direction given; not a formal board roll-call vote. - Block the “media file share” filtering category (and related video-sharing categories) at the elementary level, with Canvas/Drive/Docs added back as needed so teachers can still use required instructional tools. - Expand and accelerate district-level digital citizenship training and communications for parents, students and staff.

Board members also asked administration to survey school community councils and building leadership teams and to form a subcommittee that includes board members, teachers, parents, district staff and student representatives to produce recommendations. The board asked administration to return with results and recommendations for further action.

Robbins and IT staff said the district will also pilot or investigate adding a parent-facing monitoring product (e.g., Bark) to supplement existing filters and that the district will continue to accept parent reports of problematic sites through the Technology Connection portal. IT staff reported about 178 parent requests to change filter settings and 164 requests for "inappropriate search" reports in the past six months.

The board’s direction is administrative (not a formal vote) and officials said any deeper, districtwide switch to an allow-list model or to automatic shutdown of student accounts outside school hours would require more study and outreach to teachers and families. Board members who spoke expressed broad support for the immediate technical changes and creation of the subcommittee.