Out of hours monitoring on 1:1 devices

[Foresthippy]

We are looking at introducing a 1:1 device programme for our pupils in 2025. I'm curious, do schools monitor such devices with impero or similar, even when the pupils are out of school? What are the ethical / legal considerations here?

[IRL]

We have filtering and monitoring offsite, which was a selling point to parents to buy in to the scheme. We use Classroom.cloud in school for teachers to monitor laptops in classes but only works on the internal IP during school hours.

[Danp]

We use GoGuardian, this monitors 24/7 regardless of where they are.

[dhicks]

do schools monitor such devices with impero or similar, even when the pupils are out of school?

 

We use Chromebooks in school - school-owned devices, they don't leave the school. We use Securly for filtering / monitoring. If a child logs on with their school account to a Chromebook at home, or syncs their Google Chrome profile with their school account, then their filtering / monitoring settings would be applied. In practice, I don't think that's happening much, but it's handy for the parents that might want the option. Of course, it's quite easy for pupils to get around by logging out of their school account and logging in with a personal account, so it would need some parental supervision.

[PotNoodleTech]

We use Chromebooks in school - school-owned devices, they don't leave the school. We use Securly for filtering / monitoring. If a child logs on with their school account to a Chromebook at home, or syncs their Google Chrome profile with their school account, then their filtering / monitoring settings would be applied. In practice, I don't think that's happening much, but it's handy for the parents that might want the option. Of course, it's quite easy for pupils to get around by logging out of their school account and logging in with a personal account, so it would need some parental supervision.

 

Theres a setting in the gogle admin console to stop pupils logging in with their non school google accounts. Best practice advises for this to be enabled.

[dhicks]

Theres a setting in the gogle admin console to stop pupils logging in with their non school google accounts.

 

For our school-owned managed devices, of course, but not for pupil's own devices at home.

[PotNoodleTech]

For our school-owned managed devices, of course, but not for pupil's own devices at home.

 

Sorry thought you were talking about school devices.

[Primus]

We use Smoothwall Cloud Filter and Smoothwall Monitor - it runs regardless of where the device is although we do allow access to sites like Netflix when not onsite.

 

This operates 24/7 with a phone call from Monitor if something is sufficiently serious as to need an urgent response.

 

We did anticipate an uptick in alerts and particularly out of hours alerts ahead of moving one of our schools to 1:1 with devices being taken home. We did quite a bit of work educating the students prior to their device being issued and immediately after such that we've not seen a dramatic difference in the number of alerts and out of hours alerts are relatively infrequent - I don't believe we've had an out of hours phone call as yet.

[colly72]

We use Senso here. It was an essential requirement for our 1:1 rollout that we could monitor in and out of school. You might want to refer to the DfE standards (https://www.gov.uk/guidance/meeting-digital-and-technology-standards-in-schools-and-colleges/filtering-and-monitoring-standards-for-schools-and-colleges) for monitoring and filtering, when making a decision about mitigating any risk.

[PotNoodleTech]

Interstingly in that DFE guidance it mensions nothing about filtering school devices at the pupil's home.

 

it does say "filter all internet feeds, including any backup connections " but that appears to be talking about all on premise feeds including on premise backup feeds.

 

Anyone got any more clarification?

[colly72]

Interstingly in that DFE guidance it mensions nothing about filtering school devices at the pupil's home.

 

it does say "filter all internet feeds, including any backup connections " but that appears to be talking about all on premise feeds including on premise backup feeds.

 

Anyone got any more clarification?

 

I'd agree that it's not specific or overly prescriptive but I take it to mean that the School should assess the risk when it comes to filtering and monitoring and take appropriate steps to protect children. My take on that is that the School has a responsibility to protect its students on any School device, wherever it is being used. It comes down to individual risk assessments for each School/circumstance.

Edited October 8, 2024 by colly72

[Jamman960]

KCSIE guidelines were changed last year to include the need for offsite filtering I believe

[colly72]

Here's the key part for me:

 

You should have effective monitoring strategies that meet the safeguarding needs of your school or college

 

The importance of meeting the standard   

 

Monitoring user activity on school and college devices is an important part of providing a safe environment for children and staff. Unlike filtering, it does not stop users from accessing material through internet searches or software. 

 

Monitoring allows you to review user activity on school and college devices. For monitoring to be effective it must pick up incidents urgently, usually through alerts or observations, allowing you to take prompt action and record the outcome. 

 

I'd consider any 1:1 device to be a school device, so I'd say it's pretty clear that they should have some form of monitoring/filtering protection wherever they are being used.

[dapaulio]

We have filtering and monitoring offsite, which was a selling point to parents to buy in to the scheme. We use Classroom.cloud in school for teachers to monitor laptops in classes but only works on the internal IP during school hours.

 

I second this with smoothwall cloud filter.

 

Classroom cloud is constantly monitoring for safeguarding purposes but the console is only accessible from our internal ip during normal school hours

[Primus]

Interstingly in that DFE guidance it mensions nothing about filtering school devices at the pupil's home.

 

it does say "filter all internet feeds, including any backup connections " but that appears to be talking about all on premise feeds including on premise backup feeds.

 

Anyone got any more clarification?

 

KCSIE now says:

protecting children from maltreatment, whether that is within or outside the home, including online

[Joeloman]

In Sweden, we often see that students hide a phone in their pocket on which they have Internet sharing.

Very common with free surfing on phones in Sweden.

 

 

Which means that they can surf freely on the school computer at school, as many schools today only have the web filter in the school network, which many are now reviewing.

[Primus]

In Sweden, we often see that students hide a phone in their pocket on which they have Internet sharing.

Very common with free surfing on phones in Sweden.

 

 

Which means that they can surf freely on the school computer at school, as many schools today only have the web filter in the school network, which many are now reviewing.

 

On Chromebooks you can prevent them connecting to any other network if a managed network is in range - this can help with still having some flexibility with say Netflix at home but prevent students using a hotspot to watch Netflix in lessons.