I’ve been grumpy about ClassDojo all week, and this is the only thing that’s made me feel better about it—BECAUSE THIS IS SO MUCH WORSE.

I’ve been blogging about ClassDojo enough over the past few weeks that I think it’s time for a quick recap before sharing some of the latest developments. I heard about ClassDojo being used schoolwide back in late July and started wondering what approach I should take as both a student’s parent and an edtech researcher. On Monday of this week, I talked to kiddo’s teacher about it and wrote up some thoughts the next day about teachers’ diminished agency in the realm of edtech. In recognition of that diminished agency, I went ahead yesterday and voiced my concerns directly to the principal about ClassDojo and student monitoring software installed on Chromebooks.

I really will get back to blogging on other subjects sometime soon, but here’s an email I just sent to kiddo’s principal raising some concerns I have going into the school year. I’m not sure what will come of this—and I’m not at all sure this was the right email to write—but in the off-chance it’s helpful for someone, I thought I’d post about it here.

Dear Principal [so-and-so],

We are very excited to be joining the VPE community this year: Our daughter is excited to be starting kindergarten, and we are happy to see how supportive, welcoming, and organized everyone has been. However, as we begin the school year, I have some questions and concerns about technology use at VPE.

Compelling example of the need for digital privacy in a post-Row world.

Some really worrying privacy implications in this kind of edtech—and edtech as a discipline doesn’t care nearly enough about this kind of thing. Makes me worried as a scholar and a parent.

Concern about privacy is good, but not when it’s Sinophobic posturing. Yes, what TikTok is doing is worrying and problematic, but Bode makes an important point here: If they aren’t willing to fix the broader infrastructure, stances like Rubio’s just come down to trying to score cheap political points.

I’ve seen a number of headlines about how a post-Dobbs world changes the game for online privacy, but this is the first one that I sat down to read. School surveillance software is scary enough without this possibility, so let’s not make it worse. I can’t believe that this software gives schools any benefits that outweigh the heavy cost to students’ privacy.

Good writing here. Vague Sinophobia drives a lot of media and political concerns, and I appreciate Bode’s challenging of that here.

Well this is terrifying.

Yes please.

Frustrating to see steps that feel like progress seem to shore up the tech giants I hoped were being kept in check.

The focus on student learning in this year’s AECT reviews is good, but I worry that it blinds us to other important ed tech questions. I’d struggle to describe how surveillance, ethics, privacy impact student learning, but we desperately need that research too-or more!

Doing transcription yourself sucks. It’s long and tedious, and the final product never feels worth all the effort you put into it. For all that, though, this is exactly why services like Otter have never sat well with me.

Contract tracing is good, but apps for it are scary. Ugh.

Vive la France ! 🇫🇷🇫🇷🇫🇷

Not a great look.

File this under bad solutions to worse problems.

Takes some real self-confidence to describe an always-on camera as a feature, not a nightmarish bug.

Accelerometer data can be used for invasive tracking, and Facebook seems to be doing so. This is truly scary stuff.

Very scary stuff here.

Something else to write representatives about.

Interesting read on an important subject.

Facial recognition is worrying.

Good take on the privacy issues involved with modern gift-giving.

Terrifying stuff. I know “Orwellian” gets overused these days, but TVs that watch us are straight out of 1984.