SahwaFeb 16

Parents opt kids out of school laptops, ask for pen-and-paper

https://reddthat.com/post/60381652

Parents opt kids out of school laptops, ask for pen-and-paper - Reddthat

>The middle schooler had been begging to opt out, citing headaches from the Chromebook screen and a dislike of the AI chatbot recently integrated into it. > >Parents across the country are taking steps to stop their children from using school-issued Chromebooks and iPads, citing concerns about distractions and access to inappropriate content that they fear hampers their kids’ education.

Show threadgrueFeb 16
I’ve opted out of the school Chromebooks for my kids because they have computers running real GNU at home. We should all be outraged that schools are pushing a locked-down surveillance/content consumption-only platform, as opposed to something like a Raspberry Pi that actually empowers kids to have real computer literacy.
Show threadmodus
I’m curious to know if anyone here has ever approached the school IT department to ask what steps they take to mitigate or eliminate surveillance and tracking in these devices. I know it’s inherent in Google products to begin with, but do they even try? Or pretend to try? Or admit they don’t care?
Feb 16 at 10:30pmWeb
Show threadNewsteinleoFeb 16
The IT Department knows about all the problems it’s the administration that does not care and won’t let the IT people do anything. Also, you don’t want to know how bad the procurement process is with most school systems.
Show threadmodusFeb 16
Good point. I’ve never worked in education. I neglected the fact that they’re just fulfilling orders. I believe you it’s probably a shitshow with privacy and preemptive security procedures almost non-existent.
Show threadBazoogleFeb 16
I don’t work for a school, but I apply default policies to stop tracking/telemetry on all the company computers. I wasn’t asked to, nor do my coworkers seem to care nearly as much. So the answer is probably that it will entirely depend on the IT admin they hired and how much they care
Show threadchillpanzeeFeb 17

It’s sorta the opposite. It’s not that privacy and security are afterthoughts, it’s that oversight and monitoring are baked into everything. They lean into lockdown browsers, mandatory on cameras for assessments, and a whole bunch of anti-cheat tech. Privacy and security are on the mind, they just want none of it.

Worse than that though, it’s a carefully crafted economy where vendors knowingly supply incomplete and broken systems so that they have a continuous need to also sell professional services, training, and technical support. It’s just like textbooks and curricula; crooked AF because they know that nobody is paying attention, and the entire system operates with an expectation of profound inefficiency.

Show threadKupiFeb 17
I’ve asked about this a few times and I was told by our administration that every company we work with signs a data privacy agreement stating that they will not sell or compromise any sensitive student data. But I was also told that our administration team doesn’t usually follow up with these companies to make sure they’re following the rules. Therefore it’s an unfortunate situation of, “above my pay grade.” Also, when opting out of a Chromebook, you’re only making sure your kid doesn’t go home with one. Most, if not all, teachers don’t shy away from Google Classroom…
Show threadbestboyfriendintheworldFeb 17

The school IT department is often the math teacher’s side hustle or a badly paid gamer dude with Microsoft certifications.

Surveillance and tracking is the least of their concerns.

Show threadÜbercomplicatedFeb 17
I did! The IT department literally laughed at me. I also tried to get them to let teachers install uBlock Origin, because they apparently will watch educational YouTube videos in class sometimes, and then get random ads for everyone to suffer under. But uBlock Origin doesn’t have their support… Ironically, they only support Windows computers and iPhones on the school network. Android, MacOS, and Linux are all officially unsupported.
Show threadmodusFeb 17
Thank you for your service. That’s not surprising, but still disappointing. Do they install DNS filters locally on the machines at all? My work computers do that.
Show threadÜbercomplicatedFeb 17

Well, I unfortunately failed.

Do they install DNS filters locally on the machines at all?

No, the kids are allowed to bring their own laptops, because some rich parents insisted on their kids using MacBooks. I tried pushing Linux for the kiddo, but turns out whatever CISCO wifi system the school is using actively blocks Linux (including, for some reason, black listing the arch repos). A lot of stuff is blocked — though easily bypassed by VPNs or the wireguard router proxy I set up — by wifi black lists, including random stuff like duckduckgo and dict.cc

Actually, I did get an ad for a vibrator on dict.cc once, so maybe that makes sense after all. I, a man. Not sure what I’d use it for.

I’m unfortunately not a parent, just a relative, so there is only so much I can do to harass the school about it. I also live abroad, so 🤷 — I try though.

Show threadmodusFeb 17

Well at least they had it questioned and now they know some parents might actually care about this shit.

Not allowing specific OSs? Fuck dat. If I want to use Kali, I should be able to use Kali. I actually didn’t know that was possible with DHCP. Gross.