The Wake County Board of Education is set to vote Tuesday night on a new contract for filtering and monitoring students’ internet activities.
Students, staff and families have raised concerns in recent years about the effectiveness of the Wake County Public School System’s current internet filtering tools, namely that websites are inconsistently blocked, that students are distracted by YouTube videos and that teachers have a limited ability to view students’ online activities.
The board is set to vote on a more than $330,000, one-year contract with Howard Technology Solutions, following a pilot program with the company’s Lightspeed Internet Content Filter and Lightspeed Insights.
The district tested the new technology and found it was more accurate at filtering websites and provided more information on students’ internet use.
If approved by the school board Tuesday, the district plans to implement it later this spring, with schools starting to use it any time between Feb. 13 and March 20.
