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Can a school restrict access to certain websites on computers they provided even while we’re not at the school?

Question | Student Expression
My school recently purchased Chromebooks for all of the students, which was really awesome. But then they put all this filtering software on the laptops that prevents us from accessing certain websites, such as social media websites, even while we’re at home on our own Internet connection. This is not cool. Can the school restrict our access to certain websites while we’re not at school?
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This filtering policy is really extra and violates your free speech rights by restricting your internet access outside of school. The Children’s Internet Protection Act, which we will talk about in a minute, requires school districts to block internet access to images that are obscene, pornographic, or harmful to minors. However, they likely cannot filter these websites while students are using their Chromebooks at home. 


This policy also likely violates your First Amendment free speech rights because school authorities usually cannot restrict your internet usage while you are at your own home and using your privately funded internet access.


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The Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA), like mentioned above, requires school districts that receive a certain type of federal funding to block or filter internet access to websites and images that are obscene, pornographic, or harmful to minors (those under 18). The goal of this law is to prevent minors from viewing pornography and other material that is inappropriate for young people. This law makes a lot of sense. The government doesn’t want to spend money on technology and internet service that students could use to access Pornhub.com. Not to mention, it’s pretty inappropriate for students to be accessing that kind of material at school anyway.

However, it’s less clear whether this law applies to students while they are at home on their own internet connection. We think that CIPA probably doesn’t apply in that situation, and the school probably is going a little far by restricting your access while you’re at home. There is no evidence that suggests that this law was meant to apply while you use your devices at home. 

For example, the legislature passed CIPA in 2001, which was ten years before the Chromebook was invented. This means that the legislature probably didn’t mean for this law to apply to some device that hadn’t been invented yet, unless they could see the future. When the legislature passed this law, legislators likely believed that schools would allow students to use desktop computers in computer labs while at school, which would require this filtering software. They probably never dreamed that students would be able to take home portable devices as well.

Also, CIPA was passed to regulate money that school districts received from the federal government to fund these devices and their internet service. As we already stated, the goal behind this law was to prevent students from using federally funded internet service to view pornography and other harmful material. So it doesn’t make sense that Chromebooks and other portable devices connected to your home internet or other off-campus WiFi that is funded through a private source would need to be regulated. Quite frankly, your parents pay for their own WiFi, so whomever is allowed to use that WiFi can use it to look at almost anything they want, including porn.

This all means that the school is probably going beyond its authority to restrict under CIPA. Sure, your school can limit your access to harmful websites all it wants while you’re at school. However, if it is limiting your internet access while you’re at home or off-campus, then it is probably being overly restrictive and does not have this power under federal law.

How does this have anything to do with my free speech rights?

We thought you’d never ask! There’s a reason this question made it to the McLellan—it somehow involves your free speech rights as a student. Because CIPA does not require the school district to filter at-home internet use on school issued devices, your school’s filtering policy probably is a free speech violation.

When students access websites, they do not simply stare at them—they interact with them. Students post comments, share photos, and interact with other internet users. You know how you have to tweet everything you do to make your life sound super interesting? When you do that, you’re exercising your First Amendment free speech rights. This type of online speech is undoubtedly protected by the First Amendment. Students have First Amendment rights while at school (even though they are slightly limited), and they certainly have even greater First Amendment rights at home. This means that the speech you are creating and accessing while at home on your Chromebook is even more protected than it would be at school.

So, when exactly does filtering cross the line and become a First Amendment violation? 

According to the Supreme Court, your school has the power to ban student speech that negatively impacts the student welfare (a.k.a. the learning environment). For example, while you’re at school, schools can filter access to websites that promote illegal drug use, provide obscene or pornographic material, or disrupt a student’s ability to learn. We know, this isn’t exactly what you wanted to hear because this means that the school can block you from accessing Instagram on its WiFi without violating your First Amendment rights. However, 24/7 internet filtering probably isn’t allowed. This is because this filtering policy would apply to students of differing age groups where some material may be harmful to younger kids but not necessarily to older kids.

It’s not fair to filter all students from the same material while they’re at home and may be totally mature enough to view it. For example, an 18-year-old senior in high school is technically an adult and is arguably mature enough to view porn. However, we obviously wouldn’t want anyone younger than that accessing that kind of material. People of differing ages require differing filters, which this filtering policy does not account for. Also, this 24/7 filtering policy is a little too much because it may block content that not only does not harm the student welfare but actually improves the student welfare. 

This filtering software likely bans websites that contains the words “sex,” “condom,” “vagina,” etc. While this type of filter would prevent students from stumbling across pornographic websites, it would also prevent students from researching STDs for health class or learning about sex education. Moreover, it would also block a student from asking a medical expert for advice in an online forum on how to obtain contraception.

All in all, your school certainly has the authority to restrict your access to harmful websites while you’re at school. However, the filtering software used outside of school is unnecessarily restrictive, not legally required, and probably violates student speech rights. You have more free speech rights when you’re at home and not being a student, and your school does not have the right to limit your internet access while you are off campus.




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