Mom Says School Principal Held Her Son's Phone To His Face To Unlock It Without Permission
She questioned if a school principal has the right to go through a student's phone without consent from a parent.
GaudiLab / Shutterstock A mom is questioning whether she should schedule a meeting with the principal of her son's school after learning that his phone was unlocked without consent.
In a TikTok video, a mother named Amanda asked what she should do after her son told her that his principal went through his phone after an incident happened at school that didn't involve him at all.
The school principal held her son's phone to his face to unlock it without permission.
"I wanna ask a question to all my teachers, educators, principals, people out there that might see this. I have a question about something that happened at my son's school," Amanda insisted.
She prefaced everything by saying that she's always taught her children to respect their elders, their teachers, and their principals at school.
"If there was ever an issue and you're uncomfortable, all you say is, 'I need to call my mom'," she recalled telling her kids.
She encouraged her children to advocate for themselves in situations with people of power, and that she should be called if her presence is needed by them. However, a recent incident at her son's middle school left her with a bad taste in her mouth when her son's request wasn't fulfilled.
Amanda explained that there'd been a fight at her son's school that he was not involved in and hadn't even been around. Her son, who is in the sixth grade, received a video of the fight from a classmate who recorded it.
When the principal found out about the fight and that there was a video circulating of it, he began investigating to find out who had the video. Amanda learned that someone had informed the principal that her son had a copy of the video and two weeks later he was called to the school's office.
Photo: RDNE Stock project / Canva Pro
"He calls my son to the office and tells my son, 'I heard you had the video. I wanna see the video.'" Amanda's son remembered that his mother encouraged him to call her if he ever felt uncomfortable, so he informed the principal that he wanted to call his mother first before anything else happened.
The principal refused to listen and asked him again if he had the video of students fighting.
Amanda insisted that if the principal had called her and explained the situation to her, she would've told her son to hand over his phone so that the principal could see the video. However, the principal refused to let her son call her and instead grabbed the young boy's phone himself.
"The principal grabbed my son's phone and it had a facial recognition lock on it," Amanda said. "He turned the phone around and held it to my son's face to unlock it."
All of this happened without her son's permission. The principal proceeded to go through her son's phone, through all of his personal photos and videos to find footage of the fight.
Amanda's son ended up relaying all of this information to her later on, and now she's questioning if the school's principal even had the right to do something like that. She inquired if something like that was legal in the first place.
"Are they even allowed to do that? I know they're on school property. How would you feel about that as a parent without not being called?" Amanda asked viewers.
She explained that to make matters worse, she didn't hear about any of this until her son got home from school and said he'd wanted to call her earlier in the day when he was with the principal. She admitted that after hearing that, she was upset that the principal hadn't phoned her.
Photo: JackF / Canva Pro
In the comments section, people unanimously agreed that she should go to her son's school and speak directly to the principal.
Not only was it a violation of her son's privacy to sift through his personal phone without permission from him or his mother, but it's equally bad that the principal wouldn't let him call her or his father to speak and be there on his behalf.
The principal isn't in the wrong for wanting to look at Amanda's son's phone to find footage of the fight because that's his job and he is entitled to find information about a violent interaction that happened on the campus under his supervision. However, Amanda's son wasn't involved in the fight and he wasn't a bystander either, so he shouldn't have been treated as if he was in trouble
Her son didn't ask to have the video sent to him, and he wasn't responsible for the video being sent out either. If the principal had simply called Amanda then he have had access to the video without any issues, but instead created another problem that could've been easily avoided and remedied. Just because these students are kids and underage doesn't mean it's fine for adults to violate their boundaries under the guise of being older than them and in charge.
Certain guidelines exist in schools between students and school administrators that exist for a reason and no one is above them, no matter the circumstances.
Nia Tipton is a Chicago-based entertainment, news, and lifestyle writer whose work delves into modern-day issues and experiences.