Nanaimo-Ladysmith school trustees were brought up to date on video surveillance in SD68 at a meeting last week.
Cameras were installed at number of school district sites in 2022 for security reasons, a staff report stated, and as the school district now has better insight into "the system and its functions," video surveillance procedures for schools and school buses have been amended. Mark Walsh, secretary-treasurer, informed trustees and stakeholders about some of the amendments at a strategic directions committee meeting June 11.
He said Nanaimo Ladysmith Public Schools, in collaboration with RCMP, has expanded its used of surveillance video for the purpose of identifying after-hours trespassing and vandalism.
"I will say this has been an area … [that] has been actually quite successful in reducing vandalism and also in enhancing safety at our schools," he said. "We know where to look before folks get there in the morning."
As per the policy, before new cameras are added, a report must be made to the superintendent explaining why they are needed, with dialogue on "less-invasive" options. Additionally, the appropriate parent advisory council must consent and the school district must display clear and prominent notices in areas being recorded. Continuous hidden camera surveillance is not allowed.
In the case of police investigations, the superintendent would need to give approval to share the video, the policy states, and the footage would have to be "essential to the success of the investigation and the need outweighs the privacy interest of the persons likely to be observed."
Parents or guardians can ask to view footage with their child, and students can also view footage if "they are capable of exercising their own access to information rights under the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act." Staff members and students dealing with discipline issues can authorize a union representative or advocate to review footage. Others authorized to see video files include building administrators, staff directly affected by the footage, and employees with knowledge of video systems "for technical purposes."
In an e-mail, SD68 told the News Bulletin cameras have been on school buses for nearly 20 years and according to the policy, is "only for the purpose of promoting bus safety and discipline."
At last week's meeting, Jeff Virtanen, CUPE Local 606 education support workers' union president, wondered about "less-invasive alternatives" to cameras on buses.
"I do know that some districts do use [education assistants] on buses for the bus trips, so it's just something I wanted to put out there," he said. "We'll probably bring it up through labour management, but it caught my eye that maybe we should have EAs on buses instead of instead of cameras."
Parent groups are telling the district they aren't against surveillance, noted the secretary-treasurer.
"I think there's an understanding that we're very privacy-conscious in the sense that we're just not looking at the videos for the sake of looking at the videos … We've had a lot of push from parents at a number of our secondary schools to hopefully increase camera use within the school," Walsh said.
The policy can be viewed at http://pub-sd68.escribemeetings.com/filestream.ashx?DocumentId=17729.
