School requires registering e-readers

[custosnox]

Schools can search her purse too.

and this passed constitutional mustard when?  Sorry, but my kids know what their constitutional rights are, and will fight for them, and I will be right there with them.

[custosnox]

What happens if a kid wants to read one of the frequently banned books, like Huck Finn, Slaughterhouse Five, or Catcher in the Rye?  Kids aren't dumb.  They'll put the books on a micro SD card and slip it into the ebook reader when no adults are nearby.

Some schools are embracing ebook readers as a way to keep down text book costs.  That opens up a whole 'nother can o' worms.

[sgrizzle]

and this passed constitutional mustard when?  Sorry, but my kids know what their constitutional rights are, and will fight for them, and I will be right there with them.

School officials do not need a warrant or probable cause prior to conducting a search.

The Fourth Amendment prohibits all unreasonable searches and seizures by State officers. Reasonableness is determined by balancing the governmental interest behind the search against the privacy intrusion of the search. The Supreme Court has held that students have a legitimate expectation of privacy in their persons and accompanying possessions. However, the Court also has held that schools have a substantial interest in maintaining security and order in the classroom and on school grounds. The Court has determined that this interest justifies a more flexible standard of reasonableness for searches of students that are conducted by school officials as opposed to law enforcement officers. Thus, the Court has held that school officials, unlike the police, do not need to obtain a warrant prior to conducting a search. Nor do they need probable cause to believe that a violation of the law has occurred.

[custosnox]

That's all fine and dandy, they can put what they want on their policies, doesn't make it right, nor does it mean it will stand up against a civil suit when push comes to shove.  They are government employees, and the constitution does not make these exceptions, unless it has been amended since the last time I read it.

[sgrizzle]

That's all fine and dandy, they can put what they want on their policies, doesn't make it right, nor does it mean it will stand up against a civil suit when push comes to shove.  They are government employees, and the constitution does not make these exceptions, unless it has been amended since the last time I read it.

Apparently you missed the part where it says the Supreme Court already decided this.

[custosnox]

Apparently you missed the part where it says the Supreme Court already decided this.

No, I didn't.  However, I didn't see a specific reference.  And a ruling in one case does not mean it holds the same in a different case.  Kinda like the supreme court ruling that in one case religious symbols aren't allowed on public property (Haskall) and are in another (park in Texas).  What are the specifics of the cases that was ruled on?

[custosnox]

And are you saying your okay with the school stripping away our children's constitutional rights?

[Conan71]

I'm okay with school administrators keeping some semblance of order to maintain the educational process for everyone.  Schools are charged with maintaining a safe place to learn and with facilitating a process which minimizes unnecessary distractions and provides discipline which seems to be a foreign concept to too many parents these days.

Parents and students know the rules going in. If a parent doesn't like the rules and is convinced they are impinging on their child's Constitutional rights, then they can home school them.  Can't home school them?  Then play by the school systems set of rules.

[custosnox]

I'm okay with school administrators keeping some semblance of order to maintain the educational process for everyone.  Schools are charged with maintaining a safe place to learn and with facilitating a process which minimizes unnecessary distractions and provides discipline which seems to be a foreign concept to too many parents these days.

Parents and students know the rules going in. If a parent doesn't like the rules and is convinced they are impinging on their child's Constitutional rights, then they can home school them.  Can't home school them?  Then play by the school systems set of rules.

If you don't like the idea of your personal rights being violated then don't walk off your property, otherwise, don't complain when they give you a cavity search for walking down the street.  

You could also use the same idea to allow the school to promote a religion.

[nathanm]

custosnox, I agree completely that schools have too much authority over their charge in certain ways. However, now isn't really a great time to try to take this sort of argument before the Supreme Court. You'd be very unlikely to see a favorable ruling. Hopefully that will change over the coming years as the composition of the Court changes.

That said, schools could easily sidestep this issue. Simply have a blanket policy of confiscating anything that is disruptive to the learning environment until the end of the day. Kids can then carry whatever they like. If it becomes a problem, it gets taken away. No need to search the devices. The problem isn't the content itself, it's the disruption. Unfortunately, the authoritarians see the need to control what other people see, so they need to search the device so they can punish on the basis of content.

[sgrizzle]

[DTowner]

It's been a while since I looked at this issue, but students generally have a lower standard of protection in the search and seizure and privacy areas.  This is because of the in loco parentis status of schools and students.  As school property, locker searches are pretty much always upheld.  Searches of the person requires some reasonable basis, but the standard is lower than typically for a criminal suspect/adult.

Here it sounds like schools are simply using a policy of obtaining advanced consent to search a student's property that it otherwise would have to have some reasonable basis to search.  The student has a choice, pre-consent to a search if she wants to bring it/use it at school or don't consent and leave it at home.  With the increasing commonality of students carrying electronic devices such as smart phones, iPads, Kindles, etc., there are a lot of unanswered questions as to how far schools can go to police these devices while students are at school.  No doubt this will get heavily litigated in the coming years.

[custosnox]

  No doubt this will get heavily litigated in the coming years.

And for what? So that the school can try to control what the students see and read? Seriously, why is it any of the schools business what a student is reading on their personal equipment?

[Gaspar]

I think it has more to do about control than anything else.

When I was a kid and brought my Popular Mechanics magazine (yes I'm a geek) to school to hide in my text book and read in class or study hall, it was easy for a teacher to walk by, confiscate it and scold me for finding her lecture or assignment BOARRRRING! 

Today, kids are far more connected.  Some schools have capitalized on this, some are fighting it.  Part of being a high-functioning person is the ability to be resourceful by using all of the means at your disposal.  Schools should be embracing these new technologies and taking the lead in teaching kids how to use these resources to their advantage rather than fighting them.  Rather than disseminating information using warehouses filled with outdated text books, schools should be developing their own server-based curriculum and tools, available to any kid at any time, searchable and downloadable.  Sure, kids are going to get distracted, but that's what tests are for!

When we used to get distracted or disruptive, we got a pop quiz, and it counted towards our final grade!  I remember what an impact that made on me the first time I failed one.  I know "failure" and sometimes even "grades" are not politically correct any more, but "back in the day" they sure worked well as both incentive and punishment.

[custosnox]

I think it has more to do about control than anything else.

When I was a kid and brought my Popular Mechanics magazine (yes I'm a geek) to school to hide in my text book and read in class or study hall, it was easy for a teacher to walk by, confiscate it and scold me for finding her lecture or assignment BOARRRRING! 

Today, kids are far more connected.  Some schools have capitalized on this, some are fighting it.  Part of being a high-functioning person is the ability to be resourceful by using all of the means at your disposal.  Schools should be embracing these new technologies and taking the lead in teaching kids how to use these resources to their advantage rather than fighting them.  Rather than disseminating information using warehouses filled with outdated text books, schools should be developing their own server-based curriculum and tools, available to any kid at any time, searchable and downloadable.  Sure, kids are going to get distracted, but that's what tests are for!

When we used to get distracted or disruptive, we got a pop quiz, and it counted towards our final grade!  I remember what an impact that made on me the first time I failed one.  I know "failure" and sometimes even "grades" are not politically correct any more, but "back in the day" they sure worked well as both incentive and punishment.

never did anything for me.  It's all about a kids perception of things.  I ended up dropping out of high school a couple of months into my sophomore year.  While I had a number of my own problems, the school never had a way to engage someone like me.  Now that I'm older and returning to school with the desire to succeed (I'm super pissed at myself right now because it doesn't look like I'll be pulling off an A in Japanese and thus killing my 4.0), I find ways to stay engaged.  I actually surf the web while in geology because otherwise I would pass out during the lectures.  At least this way I stay awake and somewhat aware of what is going on in the class.  I also take notes on my computer, so it justifies me having it out.  Of course, if I was causing a disruption with it in class I would be expected to put it away, if that didn't work, then I would be removed from class.  No confiscation, no digging through my files to see what I'm doing with it.