Parent urges clearer disclosure of school's bathroom monitoring devices

Paula Colton Buck, a Kenston parent, told the board on Oct. 13 that communications about bathroom monitoring devices lacked detail and asked the district to be more transparent about their functionality.

Colton Buck said the devices installed in school bathrooms are Triton UltraCenters and that they do more than detect vaping. She listed functions she said the devices perform, including detection of THC and vape aerosols, ambient air-quality monitoring, acoustic detection for screaming, gunshots and glass breaks, keyword listening for violence-related words, people-counting that flags how long someone has been in a stall, and detection of cell-phone use. "Kenston has the Triton UltraCenters, which do the following: detect vape THC, smoke, and air quality disruption; listens for multiple keywords associated with safety, bad behavior, and aggression; listens for screaming, gunshots, and glass breaks; assigns a number to each person in the bathroom and color codes them," she said.

Colton Buck said the district's budget and meeting communications had described the devices in minimal terms (for example: "vape detectors") and urged the board to provide a standalone communication to parents, post signage in bathrooms, and create a committee to review such sensitive technology before decisions are finalized.

District response and next steps: The board chair acknowledged the comment and said staff would follow up. No formal vote or policy change occurred during the meeting. Administrators present agreed to have a staff follow-up to respond to the parent's questions and provide additional detail.

Ending: Colton Buck offered to meet with board members and staff for further discussion and asked that the district detail device capabilities and privacy protections to families before deployment of monitoring systems was treated as routine.