Stafford County Public Schools

Updated 6:15 p.m. -- The Stafford County Public School Board plans to hold its second town hall meeting where it plans to talk about how students use Chromebooks at home.

The School Board decided back in March 2022 to reduce its monthly meetings to once a month to hold town hall meetings to engage with more parents of Stafford County students.

The next town hall meeting, which is scheduled to be held on September 28, plans to address issues related to the use of Chromebooks by students. The school division widely adopted the devices when students and teachers were forced to quarantine themselves due to the Coronavirus pandemic in March 2020.

Stafford County Public Schools followed the lead of other school systems across the country and used the Chromebooks for virtual learning. However, as students have been let back into classes, the devices continued to be used by students to the chagrin of some parents.

Several parents have complained to the school system regarding using the devices at home. Moms 4 Liberty, a conservative advocacy group, sent a letter to the school board outlining their concerns with using Chromebooks, ranging from allowing students to use social media at home to health and wellness concerns, including potential effects on children's minds and potential online bullying.

Virtual learning has also been attributed to learning loss, affecting many students due to not receiving one-on-one instruction from their teachers.

The school division blocked students' access to TikTok, a popular social media website linked to China. It also encouraged students to police their internet activity while at school and at home.

At the School Board inaugural town hall meeting on June 28, Hartwood District Board member Alyssa Halstead told Potomac Local News that the issue of Chromebooks would be one of the issues that would be addressed at an upcoming meeting. The board's second town hall meeting had been originally scheduled for late July but was canceled and moved to August 23.

Today's town hall meeting was also canceled and replaced with a special meeting of the School Board, to take place at headquarters, 31 Stafford Avenue.

Stafford County Sheriff David Decatur will discuss school security with the School Board. The meeting will take place behind closed doors. The School Board will also discuss a contract for custodial services behind closed doors today to protect the division's bargaining position and negotiating strategy, according to a meeting agenda posted on the school division's website.

At the town hall meeting in June, parents and teachers in attendance complained that students have taken what they viewed as a more disrespectful tone since returning to the classroom after the pandemic.

Those individuals also made their concerns known of feelings of powerlessness due to an inability to discipline such students without themselves getting into trouble with administrators.

According to information provided by Sandra Osborn, the school system's spokeswoman, the total number of student discipline incidents in 2019 was 9,950. Out of that total, 1760 incidents resulted in the long or short-term suspension of the student or expulsion from the school system. Another 336 incidents were referred to law enforcement as a result.

According to Osborn, that each incident could involve more than one student, but the information provided didn't make such distinctions.

Numbers for 2020 are significantly lower due to the effect the coronavirus pandemic had on school closures. The total number of student discipline incidents for that year was 233. Stafford Public Schools recorded 17 incidents that were referred to law enforcement and another 97 that resulted in either short or long-term suspension or expulsion.

The next town hall meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, September 28, from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at the Brooke Point High School Auditorium at 1700 Courthouse Road in Stafford.