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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Parents refuse to allow learning robot in class

162 replies

Yabbers · 20/02/2019 17:55

link

Kier has an auto immune condition and can’t attend school when he is poorly which is half the time. A fantastic piece of kit, a learning robot, is used in 850 schools around the world, but 11 of 400 parents have refused to allow this into his school in Edinburgh. It is considered to be so secure it would take millions of years to break the encryption and there have been no incidents in all the years it has been used.

AIBU to assume these parents are Mumsnetters who bandy about “Data Protection” and “safeguarding” and because of this non existent risk have stopped this child being a part of his class.

OP posts:

Original poster

Yabbers · 20/02/2019 19:10

OP I assume you are involved with this family given your aggressive denial of anyone else’s issues in this?

Nope. Not involved. But am in a situation where this kind of tech could have been really useful to us. Have also come across parents who are stumbling blocks to helping kids with disabilities be included and it usually is done on entirely baseless reasoning, often because they perceive my child is gaining some kind of advantage.

OP posts:

ASauvignonADay · 20/02/2019 19:12

I don't know if this is the right place to ask (is there a rule against starting a new thread about a thread?!) but has anyone experienced using one (parent or teacher) - would be really good to hear first hand experience?

Original poster

Yabbers · 20/02/2019 19:12

So why let your child even go to school they could actually be abused by a teacher who has an enormous amount of power and access to them

Exactly. They could but the risk is so tiny it’s isn’t worth disrupting education for.

OP posts:

goldengummybear · 20/02/2019 19:13

If everything isn't hackable why do computer professionals cover their pc webcams with tape? Eg Mark Zuckerberg

The point about logins not being safe may be valid. For example grandparents or other carers might know the password because they log in for the child or they could be one of those people who have a list of passwords stored in a non password protected text file on the computer.

I take the point about the distraction being a weak argument but it's hard to judge from the scant info in the OP what this is all about really.

SmashedMug · 20/02/2019 19:14

I'd be interested in knowing whether the teachers had some objections and have used the parents objecting as a convenient out. It must be quite invasive as a teacher being potentially watched all day by a faceless robot.

BejamNostalgia · 20/02/2019 19:14

I’ve just looked the story up and it seems the only ‘security’ concerned parents would have would be to take this man at his word that data or pictures of their children would not be misused or shared and I’m not surprised that’s not good enough.

It’s not just idle over protective MNers anyway. I’ve known children have to leave their home and school because careless sharing online has alerted an abusive parent to their family’s whereabouts.

Bunnyfuller · 20/02/2019 19:15

You’re a pissy missy who makes me want to disagree with anything you’ve said.

You catch more bees with honey, honey.

WilkoBrandCleaner · 20/02/2019 19:15

Why on earth have you decided that this is somehow the fault of Mumsnetters and come on here to shout at everyone you (irrationally) hold responsible?

BejamNostalgia · 20/02/2019 19:15

So why let your child even go to school they could actually be abused by a teacher who has an enormous amount of power and access to them

Because teachers are DBS checked, monitored and subject to safeguarding policies. This father is not.

CripsSandwiches · 20/02/2019 19:18

If everything isn't hackable why do computer professionals cover their pc webcams with tape? Eg Mark Zuckerberg

Very few of them do and the risk of someone trying to film Mark Zuckerberg in his home is so enormously higher than that of someone trying to film a class room in which nothing interesting is happening which is why Zuckerberg is much more likely to be paranoid than a group of parents.

GunpowderGelatine · 20/02/2019 19:18

In my DD's class there is a mum who, when all the kids started in reception, was very candid about the reasons why she didn't want her DD in the background of any pictures we took. She spoke to us all individually and said that her ex had kidnapped their DD when she was 2 and tried to take her back to his home country. He was arrested and charged with kidnapping, there had been a non-molestation order in place after he had beaten her up, and he now has what is effectively a lifetime ban contacting them. She changed their surnames and moved cities because he is no longer in prison and is a genuine serious risk. If he found out where she went to school there is no doubt he'd try to take her again. She doesn't even have school photos taken as a result

If this was in their class she'd have a very good reason for not wanting it there. Yes the risk of her ex seeing via this device is extremely slim but not insignificant, and her DD's risk as a child potentially in danger trumps everything else. How do you know these parents aren't in this kind of situation?

CripsSandwiches · 20/02/2019 19:19

Because teachers are DBS checked, monitored and subject to safeguarding policies. This father is not.

You didn't read the thread - it would be very easy for the father to have a DBS check done on him. People claimed that having a DBS check wasn't sufficient.

The whole thing is so clearly ludicrous though. Anyone could dilm your child without you knowing at the park or any other public place - and in fact CCTV is often on in lots of places you go yet suddenly in a class room it poses a massive risk. (HINT it doesn't).

artisticpiles · 20/02/2019 19:21

AIBU to assume these parents are Mumsnetters

YABU

CripsSandwiches · 20/02/2019 19:22

Yes the risk of her ex seeing via this device is extremely slim but not insignificant, and her DD's risk as a child potentially in danger trumps everything else.

Well she is one of the few people who has a very good reason to be concerned but her concern doesn't trump anything else (it would have tone determined whether the risk is actually negligible or not). You could easily move this girl or the boy to a different class if the risk was not deemed to be negligible.

titchy · 20/02/2019 19:24

But am in a situation where this kind of tech could have been really useful to us.

If that genuinely is the case, which I doubt, then make an effort to understand people's real and valid concerns, without dismissing them, then come up with cast-iron solutions. Not 'and and and', or 'what if the TA is a weirdo' but actual concrete solutions.

Then you can actually do some good.

Samcro · 20/02/2019 19:27

How sad,
I do hope the parents who objected children never did become sick.

HeathRobinson · 20/02/2019 19:27

Why not stop it swivelling about and let it just face the teacher? I don't reckon parents would object to that.

Aquamarine1029 · 20/02/2019 19:28

You are being very single-minded about this, and it's alarming how dismissive you are about the concerns some parents have every right to feel.

I knew a mother who had escaped a very violent marriage and had a lifetime protection order against her ex, and this still didn't deter him from trying to find her and their child. This mother lived in constant fear, had to change names, moved several times, and even had to completely cut ties with several family members because they passed info to her ex. Her child was not allowed to be in ANY school pictures or publications. If I were that mother, I wouldn't want that robot in my child's class, either.

Drawward · 20/02/2019 19:28

Yes its not like these children will be regularly getting changed for PE in the classroom is it. Oh wait they probably will be.

I'm sure if you offered pedophile's a camera in a class room of nine year olds, with no way of knowing they are watching they would bite your hand off.

A lot of the concerns raised could be dealt with I.e Fixed camera position. allowing the teacher to see the video of the people watching on another iPad in the classroom. if some of these were looked at I would have no problem with it.

CraftyGin · 20/02/2019 19:29

We have one of these. I don’t think we asked the other parents.

TedAndLola · 20/02/2019 19:35

If that genuinely is the case, which I doubt, then make an effort to understand people's real and valid concerns, without dismissing them, then come up with cast-iron solutions.

How? The concerns raised in this thread can only be "solved" by the robot not transmitting data, which would somewhat lessen its effectiveness, wouldn't it?

Yes its not like these children will be regularly getting changed for PE in the classroom is it. Oh wait they probably will be.

This is a joke, right? You're not really so thick you think the robot would be there for changing time?

silvercuckoo · 20/02/2019 19:42

Weird. The same children are probably caught on video several times a day via CCTV / dash cams etc, with parents not having even a slightest idea of who has access to the files or how it is used or stored. But a state-of-the-art encrypted piece of equipment, sure - an abusive low life parent will certainly hire a high profile international hacking group for a dedicated crypto attack, just to check whether their child happens to be somewhere on that video.

museumum · 20/02/2019 19:44

I wouldn’t care at my ds school.
But anember if my extended family is adopting against the wishes of the birth family who cannot offers a suitable home themselves. She will not be photographed at school. And it is not worth the risk that a member of that family visits the sick child’s home as a friend or tradesman and sees her. She’s traumatised enough already.

Original poster

Yabbers · 20/02/2019 19:44

You catch more bees with honey, honey.
Yeah, not in the world of disability rights.

Why on earth have you decided that this is somehow the fault of Mumsnetters and come on here to shout at everyone you (irrationally) hold responsible?
Not to hold responsible as such, but this is the only place I ever see this kind of rhetoric about “safeguarding” so badly misused. I’ve never come across it anywhere else hence the suggestion.

and in fact CCTV is often on in lots of places
Especially in schools. Probably in this one.

dismissive you are about the concerns some parents have every right to feel.
I’m not dismissive of the concerns where safeguarding is involved. I’m saying there are solutions to every one of those concerns but the parents are refusing even to have a trial of the tech, or to accept any of the ways those concerns are being addressed. They actually said they didn’t believe the encryption was as safe as the tech data states. That’s not a valid concern.

Yes its not like these children will be regularly getting changed for PE in the classroom is it. Oh wait they probably will be.

Given Keir isn’t going to be doing PE with them, safe to say the robot can be turned off at that point.

OP posts:

AuntieCJ · 20/02/2019 19:45

I have to be honest, I'm a teacher and I don't think I'd be comfortable with being recorded constantly.

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