School posts tons of photos of students on Instagram

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our K-8 school is really careful about putting photos that include lots of faces- all kids with consent- on Stories, not posts. Posts are usually about specific projects or activities or teacher spotlights. They rarely show children’s faces and deliberately so.

Is this a private school? There are plenty of schools doing a good job of giving prospective families insight into student life without unnecessarily exposing kids on social media. It’s fair to communicate to the principal/head of your child’s school division/marketing director that you’re uncomfortable with this situation. You might not get a response, and they might not care. But for all you know 19 other families have complained and the marketing director has promised the Head of School to change the content they use once they hear 20 pieces of negative feedback.

OP here-- it's a public school. It's a murky situation for us because the new principal is very unpopular with many parents (that spouse and I are friends with as well as others we only know casually) but we've never had any issues with her (yet). There's just a sense that she doesn't care about long-standing traditions or school/neighborhood culture, and that the whole new office staff is not really on-the-ball. So for that reason we would not be surprised if she or her staff posted without checking.

Looking more carefully at all the stories and posts over the past two school years, a certain ethnicity is not represented at all and another ethnicity is way over-represented, so I think they are checking. Culturally, where we live, certain demographics care more about privacy and others not so much. I won't elaborate on that. If you know, you know. YMMV.

We really didn't want to add "monitor school's IG" to our already too long to-do list, but I think we'll take that approach since it seems 90% likely they are abiding by the consent forms.

Thanks everyone for your insights.

Wow you sound like a nightmare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our K-8 school is really careful about putting photos that include lots of faces- all kids with consent- on Stories, not posts. Posts are usually about specific projects or activities or teacher spotlights. They rarely show children’s faces and deliberately so.

Is this a private school? There are plenty of schools doing a good job of giving prospective families insight into student life without unnecessarily exposing kids on social media. It’s fair to communicate to the principal/head of your child’s school division/marketing director that you’re uncomfortable with this situation. You might not get a response, and they might not care. But for all you know 19 other families have complained and the marketing director has promised the Head of School to change the content they use once they hear 20 pieces of negative feedback.

OP here-- it's a public school. It's a murky situation for us because the new principal is very unpopular with many parents (that spouse and I are friends with as well as others we only know casually) but we've never had any issues with her (yet). There's just a sense that she doesn't care about long-standing traditions or school/neighborhood culture, and that the whole new office staff is not really on-the-ball. So for that reason we would not be surprised if she or her staff posted without checking.

Looking more carefully at all the stories and posts over the past two school years, a certain ethnicity is not represented at all and another ethnicity is way over-represented, so I think they are checking. Culturally, where we live, certain demographics care more about privacy and others not so much. I won't elaborate on that. If you know, you know. YMMV.

We really didn't want to add "monitor school's IG" to our already too long to-do list, but I think we'll take that approach since it seems 90% likely they are abiding by the consent forms.

Thanks everyone for your insights.

Wow you sound like a nightmare.

+1

[Anonymous]

If you haven't seen pictures of your child, then you have nothing to complain about.

[Anonymous]

I'm surprised a school, especially a public one, uses IG to post photos. I'd take up the issue with your school board - IG says they don't own your photos once they're uploaded, but ....

[Anonymous]

It’s pretty bad for a school to be posting of kids online, whether their parents noticed this in the consent forms or not.

Social media is forever, and these kids are just kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s pretty bad for a school to be posting of kids online, whether their parents noticed this in the consent forms or not.

Social media is forever, and these kids are just kids.

The kids aren’t named. Some of y’all need to calm down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our K-8 school is really careful about putting photos that include lots of faces- all kids with consent- on Stories, not posts. Posts are usually about specific projects or activities or teacher spotlights. They rarely show children’s faces and deliberately so.

Is this a private school? There are plenty of schools doing a good job of giving prospective families insight into student life without unnecessarily exposing kids on social media. It’s fair to communicate to the principal/head of your child’s school division/marketing director that you’re uncomfortable with this situation. You might not get a response, and they might not care. But for all you know 19 other families have complained and the marketing director has promised the Head of School to change the content they use once they hear 20 pieces of negative feedback.

OP here-- it's a public school. It's a murky situation for us because the new principal is very unpopular with many parents (that spouse and I are friends with as well as others we only know casually) but we've never had any issues with her (yet). There's just a sense that she doesn't care about long-standing traditions or school/neighborhood culture, and that the whole new office staff is not really on-the-ball. So for that reason we would not be surprised if she or her staff posted without checking.

Looking more carefully at all the stories and posts over the past two school years, a certain ethnicity is not represented at all and another ethnicity is way over-represented, so I think they are checking. Culturally, where we live, certain demographics care more about privacy and others not so much. I won't elaborate on that. If you know, you know. YMMV.

We really didn't want to add "monitor school's IG" to our already too long to-do list, but I think we'll take that approach since it seems 90% likely they are abiding by the consent forms.

Thanks everyone for your insights.

Tell me you are racist without telling me you are racist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s pretty bad for a school to be posting of kids online, whether their parents noticed this in the consent forms or not.

Social media is forever, and these kids are just kids.

I hate this too. But it seems all schools are doing it. There is no escaping having your kid plastered on social media, unless you sign a form saying otherwise. Even then, no guarantee.

[Anonymous]

Our public school is really meticulous about ensuring that kids who don't have permission aren't posted, either on social media or just in school hallways.
There aren't many kids who aren't allowed to be posted, so it's not hard just to avoid your kid and the handful of others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our K-8 school is really careful about putting photos that include lots of faces- all kids with consent- on Stories, not posts. Posts are usually about specific projects or activities or teacher spotlights. They rarely show children’s faces and deliberately so.

Is this a private school? There are plenty of schools doing a good job of giving prospective families insight into student life without unnecessarily exposing kids on social media. It’s fair to communicate to the principal/head of your child’s school division/marketing director that you’re uncomfortable with this situation. You might not get a response, and they might not care. But for all you know 19 other families have complained and the marketing director has promised the Head of School to change the content they use once they hear 20 pieces of negative feedback.

OP here-- it's a public school. It's a murky situation for us because the new principal is very unpopular with many parents (that spouse and I are friends with as well as others we only know casually) but we've never had any issues with her (yet). There's just a sense that she doesn't care about long-standing traditions or school/neighborhood culture, and that the whole new office staff is not really on-the-ball. So for that reason we would not be surprised if she or her staff posted without checking.

Looking more carefully at all the stories and posts over the past two school years, a certain ethnicity is not represented at all and another ethnicity is way over-represented, so I think they are checking. Culturally, where we live, certain demographics care more about privacy and others not so much. I won't elaborate on that. If you know, you know. YMMV.

We really didn't want to add "monitor school's IG" to our already too long to-do list, but I think we'll take that approach since it seems 90% likely they are abiding by the consent forms.

Thanks everyone for your insights.

Tell me you are racist without telling me you are racist.

I mean it feels like she pretty much just said she's a racist. Very little euphemism here.

[Anonymous]

This is fascinating and now I’m stuck on what groups are represented on OP’s school’s account.

At our school, only the white families want their children to be on Instagram and the rest of us pushed back and didn’t sign consent forms. So for a while, the school looked really, really white on Instagram and was full of reposts on Instagram stories from white families who tagged the school. Finally the school realized that was not only not at all representative of our student body but just a bad look in general, and they changed their social media marketing to focus on other aspects of the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our K-8 school is really careful about putting photos that include lots of faces- all kids with consent- on Stories, not posts. Posts are usually about specific projects or activities or teacher spotlights. They rarely show children’s faces and deliberately so.

Is this a private school? There are plenty of schools doing a good job of giving prospective families insight into student life without unnecessarily exposing kids on social media. It’s fair to communicate to the principal/head of your child’s school division/marketing director that you’re uncomfortable with this situation. You might not get a response, and they might not care. But for all you know 19 other families have complained and the marketing director has promised the Head of School to change the content they use once they hear 20 pieces of negative feedback.

OP here-- it's a public school. It's a murky situation for us because the new principal is very unpopular with many parents (that spouse and I are friends with as well as others we only know casually) but we've never had any issues with her (yet). There's just a sense that she doesn't care about long-standing traditions or school/neighborhood culture, and that the whole new office staff is not really on-the-ball. So for that reason we would not be surprised if she or her staff posted without checking.

Looking more carefully at all the stories and posts over the past two school years, a certain ethnicity is not represented at all and another ethnicity is way over-represented, so I think they are checking. Culturally, where we live, certain demographics care more about privacy and others not so much. I won't elaborate on that. If you know, you know. YMMV.

We really didn't want to add "monitor school's IG" to our already too long to-do list, but I think we'll take that approach since it seems 90% likely they are abiding by the consent forms.

Thanks everyone for your insights.

So you are saying one ethnicity tends to be OK with pics being published of their kids, and they seem to be represented more often in the pics? Ummm isn't that what you'd expect?

Confused also about why "monitoring school's IG" is so hard. By monitor, you mean, look at it? Yeah I think you can add that to your "to-do list" without too much difficulty.