Allison Butler

Surveillance Education explores the pervasive use of digital surveillance technologies in schools and assesses its pernicious effects on students. Recognizing that the use of digital technologies will persist, the authors instead offer practical ways to ameliorate their impact.In our era of surveillance capitalism, digital media technologies are ever more intertwined into the educational process. Schools are presented with digital technologies as tools of convenience for gathering and grading student work, as tools of support to foster a more equitable learning environment, and as tools of safety for predicting or preventing violence or monitoring mental, emotional, and physical health. Despite a dearth of evidence to confirm their effectiveness, digital data collection and tracking is often presented as a way to improve educational outcomes and safety. This book challenges these fallacious assumptions and argues that the use of digital media technologies has caused great harm to students by subjecting them to oppressive levels of surveillance, impinging upon their right to privacy, and harvesting their personal data on behalf of Big-Tech. In doing so, the authors draw upon interviews from K–12 and higher education students, teachers, and staff, civil rights and technology lawyers, and educational technological programmers. The authors also provide practical guidance for teachers, administrators, students, and their families seeking to identify and combat surveillance in education.This urgent, eye-opening book will be of interest to students and educators with interests in critical media literacy and pedagogy and the sociology of technology and education.

Surveillance Education explores the pervasive use of digital surveillance technologies in schools and assesses its pernicious effects on students. Recognizing that the use of digital technologies will persist, the authors instead offer practical ways to ameliorate their impact.In our era of surveillance capitalism, digital media technologies are ever more intertwined into the educational process. Schools are presented with digital technologies as tools of convenience for gathering and grading student work, as tools of support to foster a more equitable learning environment, and as tools of safety for predicting or preventing violence or monitoring mental, emotional, and physical health. Despite a dearth of evidence to confirm their effectiveness, digital data collection and tracking is often presented as a way to improve educational outcomes and safety. This book challenges these fallacious assumptions and argues that the use of digital media technologies has caused great harm to students by subjecting them to oppressive levels of surveillance, impinging upon their right to privacy, and harvesting their personal data on behalf of Big-Tech. In doing so, the authors draw upon interviews from K–12 and higher education students, teachers, and staff, civil rights and technology lawyers, and educational technological programmers. The authors also provide practical guidance for teachers, administrators, students, and their families seeking to identify and combat surveillance in education.This urgent, eye-opening book will be of interest to students and educators with interests in critical media literacy and pedagogy and the sociology of technology and education.

This volume presents a long-term qualitative study that follows 20 New York City public high school students as they make the transition into college and work. The primary data are the young people’s reflections on high school, how they felt unprepared for college or career, and the subsequent work they have done in order to succeed. The text critiques the current state of secondary and university education, especially the neoliberal emphasis on private industry and competition. However, it claims that a critical media literacy intervention can provide young people with the skills to challenge their environments and realize they are part of, not apart from, larger social issues. One unique feature of the text is its datagathering method: Stories are culled from in-person interviews and, most importantly, electronic interviews conducted on Facebook. The research was conducted, and this book written, to illustrate the very real struggles and socioeconomic challenges of young people and works to create proactive, productive change on their behalf.

This volume presents a long-term qualitative study that follows 20 New York City public high school students as they make the transition into college and work. The primary data are the young people’s reflections on high school, how they felt unprepared for college or career, and the subsequent work they have done in order to succeed. The text critiques the current state of secondary and university education, especially the neoliberal emphasis on private industry and competition. However, it claims that a critical media literacy intervention can provide young people with the skills to challenge their environments and realize they are part of, not apart from, larger social issues. One unique feature of the text is its datagathering method: Stories are culled from in-person interviews and, most importantly, electronic interviews conducted on Facebook. The research was conducted, and this book written, to illustrate the very real struggles and socioeconomic challenges of young people and works to create proactive, productive change on their behalf.

Media Education Goes to School examines the struggles involved in integrating media education across the curriculum at a small urban school. Based on quasi-ethnographic research – specifically semi-formal individual and group interviews with twenty-one participants and participant-observation – the text focuses on how students understand and make meaning of media education in their schools, and what they know about urban education and urban school reform. The book argues against the neoliberal ethos that continuously harms urban youth and the rhetoric of new school reform that replicates, not heals, subjected social positions. Media education is a necessity in secondary schooling, but it cannot be thoroughly integrated into schools until significant structural changes are made in education: this book positions the site of change through the struggles students express with their own experience of education.