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Parents warned as porno problem plagues district

School District 43 has been plagued with an internet problem that puts pornography within easy reach of students and yet it doesn't have money to pay for network monitoring software that could fix it.

School District 43 has been plagued with an internet problem that puts pornography within easy reach of students and yet it doesn't have money to pay for network monitoring software that could fix it.

Superintendent Tom Grant is issuing warnings to parents to keep an eye on their children's web searches because they could inadvertently turn up pornographic images, which are being increasingly linked to legitimate websites.

"Just turning kids loose, you are sending them to all sorts of things that may be inappropriate," Grant told trustees at Tuesday's board of education meeting.

Grant made his plea for increased supervision on the same night a preliminary budget was presented with no money for technology upgrades or for software that could screen and block inappropriate content. According to SD43's technology services manager Brian Kuhn, technology is available that would remove the images linked to common school district search terms.

"We can block it from students and make it not show up in schools," he said, but until the district can afford to install it, legal action and other steps are being taken to try to get rid of the material.

The district estimates the first year of a phased internet upgrade, including fibre optics at some high schools and the board office, monitoring software and a staff person would cost $875,000 but there is no money in the 2011/'12 operating grant for new programs and services. Instead, the district is proposing to wait for an enrolment hold-back grant, which may come next year.

In the meantime, Kuhn said SD43's lawyers are trying to convince search engines Google, Yahoo and Bing to take steps to remove the content but progress has been slow. The source of the pornography, a man living in the U.K., has agreed to take down his website, which has coincidentally been linked to common district search terms.