Their iPad filters off, Kansas Catholic third graders get a six-week lesson — in porn

The end of third grade is supposed to be marked by parties, cupcakes and notes to beloved teachers — not parental uproar over porn.

But at Sacred Heart, a tiny Catholic elementary school about an hour southwest of Kansas City in Ottawa, Kansas, the past two months have been filled with angry parents, accusatory emails, tears, phone calls and meetings with the school’s first-year principal over what might have been six to seven weeks of access to pornography on the third graders’ unfiltered iPads.

The principal insists the school took measures as soon as it understood the severity of the situation.

“I think the most I can say,” the principal, Patrick “P.J.” Greer, told The Star, “is that there was a time period where there was some really unfortunate things going on with the use of iPads in our building. … When it became known to me that things were happening at the level they were happening, I took action.”

But angry parents maintain they alerted the school at the start of March that some third graders may have been viewing “sexually inappropriate content” on their iPads, but the school failed to act for weeks. Worse still, they say, is the school’s attempt to cast at least partial blame on some of the kids, who are 9 or 10 years old.

“It’s basically a complete dismissal of accountability,” said outraged parent Brian Desch, who, because of this incident, does not plan on re-enrolling his third grade son in the school next year. “They’re just pointing the finger everywhere. I was paying my son’s tuition because I bought into the image of, you know, ‘We’re going to hold ourselves to a higher standard. We’re going to be accountable. We’re going to live a moral life filled with integrity and honesty.’ And I have yet to see where any of that has been displayed with the leaders of that school.”

As grandparents, John and Debbie Duncan help care for their third grade granddaughter because of family problems.

“I’m the reason she was sent to Sacred Heart,” said Debbie Duncan, who attended Catholic schools for 12 years. “I thought she would be in a more protective surrounding. Not only would he (the principal) not take responsibility, he attacked her. He said I wonder where a child would learn a word like that? The word was ‘porn.’ I said, ‘I don’t know where she got it, but she accessed it at school.’ All they had to do was type in the word ‘porn’ on Google. …

“It’s just been one horrible step after another of trying to get somebody to take responsibility. … I don’t think the Catholic Church needs any more bad publicity when it comes to issues like this.”

The plan for their granddaughter next year: “At this point, she’s not going back,” Duncan said.

Parents notified school about the porn

Part of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas, Sacred Heart is a school of 93 preschool to fifth grade students in a town of 13,000. The third grade has 16 students.

An email thread shared with The Star indicates a set of parents notified the principal in March that a child said kids were searching terms for breasts and images had appeared. Rumors of students calling up pornographic images began swirling around the school. The parents again emailed the principal about three weeks later that kids were talking about access to “porn.”

Three more weeks passed. On April 18, Desch, who works in information technology, said he met with the principal and offered help. He was told that the school had mistakenly let its paid filter protection lapse on the devices. Without the filters — software that blocks certain websites or specific material — the kids could search sexual sites.

“I offered my services for free,” Desch said. “I said, ‘Hey, if you have an issue blocking these things out, give me five minutes per iPad, I can do this for you.’ He dismissed it.”

Six days later, on April 24, nearly seven weeks after the first alert, the school sent out a letter on “growing problems” with the use of technology in the third grade classroom.

“There have been reports of students using the google search engine to look up inappropriate things and pictures,” it reads.

But disturbing to some parents was the next line, which they say sounded as if blame was cast at the kids:

“Pinpointing and proving which student(s) have been responsible for these actions at the current oversight we have of our student devices has proven difficult.”

The letter said the school acquired an Apple account that offered better oversight. The principal updated the devices’ security, added extra parental locks. Instead of sharing iPads, each student would have their own.

“This will be the iPad that they are responsible for,” Greer wrote. “I will be looking at the use history of each device and they are responsible for what is on that device. They are not to let anyone use or borrow their device. … Some students have approached me with information about who has been looking at these things. I told them to write in a note for me what they know, and I will look over the information.”

Further letters outlined more action. The principal sent out two parental guides on dealing with childhood exposure to porn. Greer told parents he was considering bringing in a counselor “to help both parents and students process and identify any grief or trauma” regarding the event.

‘Inappropriate online access’

Parents are split. Some are still angry and feel the school and church are trying to brush aside a traumatizing event. Others are calling for understanding.

Sarah Smith’s father attended Sacred Heart. She attended Sacred Heart. Her daughter, she said, is among the what she believes to be only a small number of students in the class to view any images.

She thinks the school has handled the situation well and, in an email to parents, urged understanding.

“Our kiddos have TWO years left at our treasured school — TWO — and then we release them into the wilderness …,” she wrote. “Yes, I know every parent would want to know if their child was exposed to porn in the classroom. … I truly feel this is a time for ALL OF US to come together for our children. Let’s stop the secret meetings, full of nothing but negative words regarding our (Sacred Heart School) Staff who care so much for every student at that school — let’s LOVE MORE and offer grace to others.”

Nationwide debates have raged in public schools, where books have been taken off of library shelves in response to parental complaints over children having access to materials with sexual themes or content regarding gender.

“We went to the Nelson-Atkins Museum over spring break,” one upset mother told The Star. An Ottawa business owner, she asked to remain anonymous, concerned about how the split among local parents could affect her livelihood. “I have no problem with my child seeing Greek statues of naked people at all. None.

“There is no question, psychologically, the extensive damage to the development in the brain of children who are exposed to this type of pornography. It undermines their ability to develop a very fundamental part of life.”

The diocese is not denying that its safeguards lapsed and the matter was not handled well.

“Our school has fallen short in safeguarding our youngsters from this inappropriate online access,” Allison Carney, the Archdiocese’s associate superintendent of schools, told The Star in a written statement. “We know that our school families are disappointed and concerned by this incident, but we want them to know that we are working hard to discover what happened here, and we hope what we learn from this situation will help us improve our systems and processes going forward.”

In early May, Greer sent a letter saying that all iPads in the third grade had been removed. A psychological counselor was brought to the school. A new online security system has been purchased. He apologized.

“The events that occurred leading to this are truly horrible,” Greer wrote. “That this occurred under my leadership of the school is something that saddens me as someone who is responsible to help keep our kids safe.”