Outcry For Alleged Sexual-Murder Video On Ridgewood School Laptop

RIDGEWOOD, NJ — Village school officials are coming under fire after a parent reported her 8-year-old son viewed an inappropriate video on a district-issued Chromebook.

Candace Young said at a Board of Education meeting Monday that her son recently viewed a "sexual bloody murder video" on a Chromebook.

"We were reassured this type of thing would not happen," Young said. "This is extremely serious, you can't take something back like that."

Superintendent Daniel Fishbein said Chromebooks have built-in safe guards and encouraged parents who know their children viewed inappropriate material online to inform officials immediately. But the laptops apparently don't prevent students from watching certain videos.

Kindergarten through fifth-grade students may not take Chromebooks home. Older students who can must still log on to the district system to view content.

School Board Vice President Jim Morgan, however, said he wants the matter investigated.

"This is not something children should be exposed to, and parents should be comfortable that educational tools are being used for education and not this kind of thing," Morgan said.

Young said she had asked to meet with a district counselor, "because, quite frankly, I don't know how to deal with the situation."

Young said it "took a lot of coaxing" from her son to find out what he saw. He was sent to deliver something to another classroom and a boy there had it on his laptop. That boy saved the video onto his Chromebook's desktop, played it for her son, and then "hid it," she said.

Young also said another parent told her that her child watched a "suicide video" on a Chromebook and that, in a separate incident, a child was able to "access porn and play video games" on the their device at home.

"I'm asking how we can come together as a community and figure out how to stop this," Young said.

Email: daniel.hubbard@patch.com

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