Stopping a Child Predator at East Irondequoit Central School District

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Student Access to Online Tools Opens Door to Danger

The Challenge:

A 1:1 district, students in K–8 have iPads while those in 9–12 receive laptops. Students are allowed to take their district-issued devices home during the school year beginning in the third grade. “We had talked about student email for a long time, and there was always a concern about how we would monitor that,” said Executive Director of Technology Christine Osadciw.

“We got to the point where a lot of our web-based products were requiring an email from a student. It was blocking us from using some of the instructional tools, so we decided it was time to figure out how to implement this while making sure that students would be safe.”

A circular maze with a lightbulb in the middle of it.

Implementing Online Safety Monitoring Tool

The Solution:

“As a tech director, it’s difficult. With all of these different online tools that our students have access to, it gets harder and harder to keep them safe,” said Osadciw.

The district decided to implement Gaggle Safety Management to address concerns about student use of email and OneDrive on district-issued devices.

A yellow lightbulb that has been turned on.

Catching a Child Predator

The Results:

In one particular instance, Gaggle helped keep an 11-year-old student out of harm’s way when a child predator attempted to send her pornographic content. Gaggle intercepted the file in question to ensure that the sixth-grade student wouldn’t be exposed to the content.

The file was then sent to the local police department so they could do their investigation. The district worked with the police, who conducted an investigation over four months that resulted in the arrest and conviction of a 36-year-old male in Michigan.

“With all of these different online tools that our students have access to, it gets harder and harder to keep them safe. If I didn’t have a tool like Gaggle, we wouldn’t be able to do this. We have to have something in place that’s looking at what’s coming and going.”

Christine Osadciw

Executive Director of Technology

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