LOCAL NEWS
Edmonds School District internet outage disrupts seniors’ year
This is the time of year when high school seniors are gathering their first-semester transcripts to send off to college admissions offices.
But seniors in the Edmonds School District have been unable to access that information since some sort of security breach caused officials to take down the internet.
Edmonds School District’s internet still down after ‘suspicious activities’
The district hasn’t had any internet access on school computers since the beginning of February when they first alerted parents, teachers and students of so-called “technology issues.”
At the time, they hoped the situation would be resolved in a day or so, but 10 days later, there is no word when the internet will be restored.
This is especially a problem for seniors in need of their transcripts.
A statement sent out by the Edmonds School District reads: “We understand the hardship our technology issues have caused for our seniors who have college acceptance decisions dependent on access to first semester transcripts. We are preparing a letter seniors can share with colleges and universities explaining the situation the district is dealing with to make sure these institutions understand the delay is a district issue and not something our students can control. Once our technology issues are resolved, we will work as quickly as possible to finalize first-semester grades for all our students.”
Edmonds School District officials say they are installing new security software on all district computers, and in their words, “this takes time.”
Since students and teachers have been unable to access their laptops in school, teachers have moved back in time, reverting to paper and pencil and other education tools used before the internet became so important in schools.
The timing of the situation is particularly concerning because the spring semester began Jan. 31. Its been difficult for people to access their new class schedules and attendance lists.
The district says they continue to work through the situation “cautiously.”
