Bullhead City board reviews student-monitoring tools, district leaders describe alerts and privacy safeguards

The Bullhead City School District governing board on Aug. 21 reviewed the district's use of internet-monitoring software and a document-scanning program intended to detect threats, self-harm signals and safety risks on school accounts and devices.

Dr. Stewart, the district superintendent, told the board the district uses GoGuardian and BARC and that the systems create keyword-based alerts that staff review when an incident is flagged. "The system just alerts to keywords. It doesn't make a judgment about is this bad or good," Dr. Stewart said, explaining that staff must examine context before concluding whether a student violated a rule.

The discussion came after a recent court case in Tucson involving monitoring of a student's school email. Dr. Stewart said the district wanted to be "in front of it" in case parents question why the district uses monitoring tools. She said federal rules that protect children under age 13 are a factor in the district's approach and that the district informs families about monitoring through its acceptable-use policy, which parents sign on their child's behalf.

Board members heard particulars about how the technology is operated and why the district uses it. Dr. Stewart said teachers can, in class, restrict student access and call up individual student screens; principals or other authorized staff look at alerts if there is reason to investigate. "Nobody sits and looks at this. Nobody even looks at it every day," she said, adding that staff examine dashboards and alerts only when an issue arises.

District staff displayed examples: alerts that flagged drug- or alcohol-related content, violence, bullying and profanity. Dr. Stewart said the district uses BARC (a scanning service) to scan district email accounts and digital documents for signs of serious issues such as threats or self-harm; she said BARC is free for schools, though families can pay to use the service personally.

The board also received cost information for GoGuardian. Dr. Stewart said the district pays $5.51 per student per year for the student monitoring module and an additional $5.51 per student per year for the teacher tools that allow classroom-level controls. She said the district budgeted about $27,000 for the services based on an anticipated 2,300 students over the course of the year.

Dr. Stewart described examples where the systems have alerted staff to situations that allowed the district to intervene: "We've had instances in the past where we have been alerted to possible upcoming situations ... so we can get in front of it. So we can, you know, help a student who is maybe considering self harm." She emphasized that the software flags keywords and that human review determines the response.

Nut graf: The board's briefing clarified how the district balances student privacy and safety. The presentation explains what the programs monitor, how alerts move through the district's workflow, the program costs, and the legal and policy basis the district cites for monitoring school accounts and devices.

Board members asked no changes at the meeting; the materials were presented as information and as part of a first reading of related policy advisories. The presentation noted the district is one of 52 in the state and that only a subset of districts in the county use similar monitoring software.

Ending: District leaders said they will make the information available to the public for review and that questions from parents would be addressed using the district's existing acceptable-use policy and training for staff about reporting and investigation procedures.