Westlake schools to restrict YouTube to pre-approved videos on middle school devices
The Eanes school district announced this month that it will further restrict YouTube on iPads issued to middle schoolers starting next fall, allowing students access only to videos pre-approved by staff. The move came after a group of parents pushed for more restrictions on student devices, citing distractions in class and the possibility of accessing inappropriate content on school devices.
Chief Technology Officer Kristy Sailors said the change occurred because of a combination of parent and teacher feedback.
"We had conversations with teachers and administrators, and we visited classrooms,” Sailors said. “We listened to the parents' feedback and just spent a lot of time this semester talking to teachers about what would work best for them. When we did all of that data collection and had those conversations, we realized that we did need to go ahead and make a change based on teacher recommendations.”
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Starting in August, teachers will need to fill out a form and submit it to technology services with details about any video they want students to access, Sailors said, including the link to the video, the content area, and which grade level they want to see the content. Technology services staff will then alter the restrictions to the video to make it available. Students will have limited search capabilities within YouTube and will not be able to see videos without pre-approval.
Once a video is approved by a staff member, it will remain approved for students at the middle school level. Sailors said the goal is to let approvals roll over year after year to cut down on teachers filling out repetitive forms, but that administrative staff will assess the situation after the first year and see what makes sense.
One downside of this system, Sailors said, is that it adds an additional step for teachers and reduces some level of spontaneity in the classroom, since the forms have to be filled out in advance. However, Sailors said teachers will retain full access to YouTube on staff devices and can show students videos as a class without going through the process of approving them first.
Brooke Shannon, a parent who has been pushing for further YouTube restrictions for years, said the change at the middle school level was a good first step.
“I think it'll make a big difference as far as learning goes moving forward once they make the change for the upcoming school year. I was disappointed, though, that the change did not also apply to the high school,” she said. “I still think high school kids are still going to be distracted by what the middle schoolers are distracted with as far as having access to sports, movies and social media videos during class on school devices.”
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Shannon said she hopes the district is proactive about managing technology and reducing online distractions.
“I just want the best learning environment for my kids and all the kids in the district,” she said. “Our children go to these schools and they are there for seven or eight hours a day. I want to trust that they're in the best learning environment. And a lot of that has to do with that device that every single hand in our district has, that iPad. ... If we're going to have that much access to, for that much time during the day, let's make it the safest device that we can with the best parameters in place to make sure our kids are focused.”
Elementary and high school iPads will stay the same next year, Sailors said. Elementary school students are issued “green iPads” that have a number of restrictions, including no access to YouTube.
High school iPads will continue to have a series of filters in place based on age to safeguard against mature content.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Westlake schools to restrict YouTube further on middle school devices
