Targeted or Protected? When School Social Media Rules Feel One‑Sided

This week, I had an experience at my children's school that left me with serious questions about how we handle parent photos and social media.

Earlier in the week, I was volunteering at Cultural Arts Week at Pomfret Community School as a PTO parent. During the event, I took some photos and videos. I later made a quick 16‑second video of students enjoying the activities, which I shared on my private social media account, where I regularly post about school and community events as a parent.

Me & the Star of Our Show, Ivet, with some of our boys at Cultural Arts Week

On the last day of Cultural Arts Week, the principal pulled me aside in the middle of my shift volunteering and told me I had to remove the video. I was told there had been a complaint from a staff member and a parent, and that I “did not have permission” to post it. I complied and took the video down. In all of the 4 years I've been doing this while volunteering my time at PCS, there has never been a complaint. I also want to note that the way she handled the situation came across as very unprofessional and unnecessarily rude. Other parent volunteers described the interaction as "aggressive" and were confused as to why she had to pull me in the middle of our event, versus talking to me before or after, in private, as opposed to out in the open during the event. There are ways to say things and places to say them; I feel she failed on both accounts.

Afterward, I went back and reviewed our district’s policy 6141.324, “Posting of Student Work/Photographs.” From my reading, that policy appears to regulate official district and school publications and websites – how the school uses student images – and I could not find any clear language that prohibits parents or PTO volunteers from sharing photos or videos from school events on their own personal accounts, nor anything that requires written permission from every parent before a parent posts an image from a school event.

At the same time, many other parents have recently posted photos and videos from school events, including the first-grade play that took place just last night, where my own child appears in the background or on stage. I have never been asked for written permission for those posts, and to my knowledge, no one has been told to take them down.

Because of this inconsistency, I emailed the principal, superintendent, and Board of Education chair to ask for clarification on several basic questions:

• Does policy 6141.324 apply only to district publications, or is it also being applied to parents and volunteers using their personal social media?

• Is there any separate written policy that governs parent photography or social‑media sharing at school events?

• If the expectation is that parents may not post identifiable photos or videos of students without permission, how is that expectation communicated to families and enforced consistently?

• Will the same takedown expectation be applied to all parents who have shared similar content from school events?

As of this writing, I have not yet received a response. I will definitely be reporting back when I do.

I want to be very clear: I complied with the principal’s request, and I respect the importance of protecting student privacy and safety online. I also recognize that schools have legal obligations around student information that parents do not.

But I also believe families deserve clearly written, publicly available, and consistently applied policies. If parents are going to be told they “don’t have permission” to share a brief, positive clip from a school event, then that standard should be spelled out in writing and applied evenly to everyone – not enforced selectively based on who happens to post.

This isn’t just about one 16‑second video. It’s about transparency, fairness, and trust between schools and families. When expectations are vague or unwritten, it puts parents and staff in an impossible position and opens the door to perceived favoritism or targeting.

I’m sharing this experience not to attack any individual, but to start a serious, public conversation about how we handle parent photos and social media in our schools. Clear communication and consistent enforcement help protect students and maintain confidence in our school community.

As both a parent and a member of the Board of Education, I will continue to ask for clarity on these policies so that every family knows where the lines are – and so those lines are the same for everyone.

This post reflects my personal experience and opinions as a parent. I am not speaking on behalf of the Pomfret Board of Education.