Page 5 | To ask school to remove photos

WillowCraft · 2023-09-09T20:38:27+00:00

We decided not to put any photos of our children on social media until they are old to enough to consent to it themselves. We don't have them on our facebook pages and have asked family not to either. The reasons for this are privacy mainly, although there is also a safety aspect - though this is not the main concern. My son started school last week and I requested no photos on social media or the school website. Now the school have posted several pictures of my son on Facebook - they are taken from behind or the side so don't show his face but it's still recognisably him as several people have commented to me. The photos are of a small number of children - 2 or 3 - not as part of a larger group. I feel they shouldn't have done this and feel inclined to ask them to take the pictures down - however unfortunately this school is constantly putting stuff on Facebook - the whole of last year's reception class were on there most weeks, often with their work and their name showing. I am worried that if I say no pictures that my son will feel singled out and will never be picked for anything - he will never get a leading role in the school play for example, and will have to stand to the side every time they take photos - which is at least weekly. I do think the amount they post on facebook is completely inappropriate, I would be happy with photos on a password protected page visible only to parents but not open to the public. I would be less happy but ok with occasional photos as part of a large group on SM. I really hate the idea that anyone who wants can track my child's progress through primary school! Has anyone experienced similar and what did you do?

Nicesalad · 09/09/2023 23:01

There's a huge difference between having your photo in a local paper ( the actual paper version) to having your photo on a website .

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:02

YetMoreNewBeginnings · 09/09/2023 22:57

Yet it Ofsted discover they’ve included children they have no consent for they’ll find their safeguarding massively called into question…

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I very much doubt the picture of the back of a kids head is going to the focus of an ofsted inspection.

Nicesalad · 09/09/2023 23:02

You really shouldn't have to sacrifice anything in order to go to school and be included in everything that happens there

Charmatt · 09/09/2023 23:04

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:02

I very much doubt the picture of the back of a kids head is going to the focus of an ofsted inspection.

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They sometimes do a random cross check on consent

NeedToThinkOfOne · 09/09/2023 23:04

OP, you don’t have to justify your choices around consenting to use of your child’s image. You said no, they still published it because someone was naive enough to think if it’s the back of the head, that’s ok then and the consent form doesn’t count.
They should remove the image when you ask.

Womencanlift · 09/09/2023 23:04

Did you choose this school or were you assigned it (either via the selection system or catchment area depending where you are in the country)?

If you chose it then I think you should have considered their SM presence before sending your child to the school if this is such an important issue to you

Rayaandthedragon · 09/09/2023 23:05

Isn’t the crux of this issue respect?

School: Do you as a parent permit photos online?

Parent: No

School: Noted

Surely should be the end? As always, we’ve complicated things.

ShipSpace · 09/09/2023 23:05

It’s not just personal and family issues which are a huge safeguarding risk to certain children, it’s also the fact that a person’s image is DATA.

Data which can be harvested and used to scan you, or in ways which may make your child’s life very difficult when they are an adult.

Technology and use of AI is evolving at rapid speeds. There will be ways to use this data in the future that we haven’t even thought of yet.

Original poster

WillowCraft · 09/09/2023 23:06

Araminta34 · 09/09/2023 22:51

I really hate the idea that anyone who wants can track my child's progress through primary school

I can't believe you would think that anyone would be interested in "tracking your son's progress through primary school.' Especially as they can't actually track his progress from a photo of the back of his head.

Again - if no one's interested why post the pictures at all?

Also I think you're quite naive not to see how this level of detailed information could be misused. You can find out a lot about someone from reading their primary school work. The only people interested (apart from close family, friends and the school community, who don't need to to use FB to find out about school stuff) will be those who are up to no good.

OP posts:

HarrietJet · 09/09/2023 23:07

I don't believe for an instant that several people have commented on a photo of your child not showing their face. That's stretching credibility a bit too far.

YetMoreNewBeginnings · 09/09/2023 23:08

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:02

I very much doubt the picture of the back of a kids head is going to the focus of an ofsted inspection.

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They do check things like that.

It's very often seemingly small things like that where schools do cock up their safeguarding so Ofsted often check things exactly like that.

Especially as often it's not staff who are privvy to the ins and outs of all of a child's information that uploads things to social media. So it should be as simple as "A, B and C are allowed in photos, Y and Z are not".

ShipSpace · 09/09/2023 23:08

I firmly believe that when this generation of children are adults, there is no way on this earth they will be posting photos and videos of their own children in unsecured internet sites.

The dangers will be so much better understood by then.

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:08

Maybe this IS a grey area that needs to be addressed then. I think it is widely accepted that a picture of a child's hands while working, back of the head, emojis used to cover faces etc is accepted and is following gdpr. Obviously, children's names are not visible on their work etc. As this would be a serious breach.

Charmatt · 09/09/2023 23:09

Womencanlift · 09/09/2023 23:04

Did you choose this school or were you assigned it (either via the selection system or catchment area depending where you are in the country)?

If you chose it then I think you should have considered their SM presence before sending your child to the school if this is such an important issue to you

This is irrelevant- if you do not give your consent for photographs to be published then it is a data breach to do so. The school can't circumnavigate the law.

Charmatt · 09/09/2023 23:10

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:08

Maybe this IS a grey area that needs to be addressed then. I think it is widely accepted that a picture of a child's hands while working, back of the head, emojis used to cover faces etc is accepted and is following gdpr. Obviously, children's names are not visible on their work etc. As this would be a serious breach.

It's not widely accepted. One phonecall to the ICO would clarify this.

It's lazy of the school and wrong.

YetMoreNewBeginnings · 09/09/2023 23:10

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:08

Maybe this IS a grey area that needs to be addressed then. I think it is widely accepted that a picture of a child's hands while working, back of the head, emojis used to cover faces etc is accepted and is following gdpr. Obviously, children's names are not visible on their work etc. As this would be a serious breach.

That has never been widely accepted in any school I ever worked in.

Nor was it something that would have been accepted by Ofsted in the inspections of the before/after school care and holiday playscheme I ran.

It was as simple as consent or no consent.

TTCnewbies · 09/09/2023 23:11

If his face isn't shown, I wouldn't have an issue. I imagine there'll be a few children who aren't allowed on SM so there's bound to be the back of a child in photos!
And as a Brownie leader it was a pain having to leave one child out. And it isn't that a photo is more important than the fun, but more that the other parents wanted to see photos but we'd always have to make sure that child wasn't in the photo (and you could guarantee they'd always be up there in the centre!)
Why shouldn't photos be taken? Why shouldn't other parents have photos of their kids group experiences. Just be honest with your child about your reasons so they understand why they are being left out.

LaRevolution · 09/09/2023 23:12

Womencanlift · 09/09/2023 23:04

Did you choose this school or were you assigned it (either via the selection system or catchment area depending where you are in the country)?

If you chose it then I think you should have considered their SM presence before sending your child to the school if this is such an important issue to you

Sorry, what?! Are you saying all parents should be choosing schools based on how active their social media presence is?...If only there was a way to screen this out of the equation by providing a simple Yes/No consent question to all parents when their kids started school!

This is quite a depressing thread really. Some posters have a very narrow worldview when it comes to safeguarding and the complicated situations that some families can find themselves in. Congrats on life being simple! But labelling the OP pathetic for considering how best to navigate this issue is, at best naive and at worst demonstrates some real dickishness, IMHO.

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:12

YetMoreNewBeginnings · 09/09/2023 23:08

They do check things like that.

It's very often seemingly small things like that where schools do cock up their safeguarding so Ofsted often check things exactly like that.

Especially as often it's not staff who are privvy to the ins and outs of all of a child's information that uploads things to social media. So it should be as simple as "A, B and C are allowed in photos, Y and Z are not".

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No one should be uploading photos if they are not privy to that information. That I agree.
I am not trying to be awkward. Safeguarding first and foremost the important part of school life.
What I have issue here is with ofsted who demand the extra workload from teachers in taking thousands of pictures and then use them to try trip them up. They are a joke.

HarrietJet · 09/09/2023 23:13

YetMoreNewBeginnings · 09/09/2023 23:10

That has never been widely accepted in any school I ever worked in.

Nor was it something that would have been accepted by Ofsted in the inspections of the before/after school care and holiday playscheme I ran.

It was as simple as consent or no consent.

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Really? A picture of the back of someone's head? You'd have to have a bizarrely distinctive head to be recognisable from the back, when everyone around you is dressed identically 😵‍💫

Redebs · 09/09/2023 23:15

ShipSpace · 09/09/2023 23:05

It’s not just personal and family issues which are a huge safeguarding risk to certain children, it’s also the fact that a person’s image is DATA.

Data which can be harvested and used to scan you, or in ways which may make your child’s life very difficult when they are an adult.

Technology and use of AI is evolving at rapid speeds. There will be ways to use this data in the future that we haven’t even thought of yet.

Exactly this.

Too many people are unaware of the potential for data abuses in the future.

Some even put their DNA in the hands of commercial databases with no thought of what it can be used for.

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:15

Charmatt · 09/09/2023 23:10

It's not widely accepted. One phonecall to the ICO would clarify this.

It's lazy of the school and wrong.

Edited

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All of my fiends children go to schools where you see a child with a face covered by an emoji. It is everywhere.
It is not something I personally would do if I were uploading a picture.

YetMoreNewBeginnings · 09/09/2023 23:15

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:12

No one should be uploading photos if they are not privy to that information. That I agree.
I am not trying to be awkward. Safeguarding first and foremost the important part of school life.
What I have issue here is with ofsted who demand the extra workload from teachers in taking thousands of pictures and then use them to try trip them up. They are a joke.

Show quote history

The only information they need to know is who is and isn't allowed in photos. It's not necessary for every single member of staff to need to be aware of the reasons why - it's not something that is an opinion thing so that's unnecessary.

Ofsted is a totally different issue and isn't one that excuses the OP's child's school from cutting corners - which they are doing.

It's very simple when it comes to photos. A child is either allowed in them online or not. No grey areas.

shieldmaiden7 · 09/09/2023 23:16

OnAMidnightTrainToGeorgia · 09/09/2023 21:49

Yeah he will likely be excluded from things due to this

No point posting pics of the school play if key characters can't be seen

Not necessarily, children in my sons school who's parents have asked not to have their faces on social media usually have a emoji or their faces blacked out and they ask parents if it's acceptable before posting.

A child isn't going to be refused parts in school plays etc just because they can't put photos on fb. Life is all about fb 🤦🏻‍♀️

NeedToThinkOfOne · 09/09/2023 23:17

ApplePlantagenet · 09/09/2023 23:08

Maybe this IS a grey area that needs to be addressed then. I think it is widely accepted that a picture of a child's hands while working, back of the head, emojis used to cover faces etc is accepted and is following gdpr. Obviously, children's names are not visible on their work etc. As this would be a serious breach.

Pictures in a school context, portraying school work and activities are not the problem. It’s where the image itself is posted. It’s not a picture in an inky, single-use chip wrapper newspaper as it used to be.
Every image is a piece of data, has a value and is no longer within the safe space of a school community as soon as they post it on a third party social media platform.