Bothell High student petitions district to stop social media monitoring

BOTHELL, Wash. — A Bothell High senior, James Allsup, has created an online petition asking the Northshore School District to stop monitoring student Twitter accounts. 

Allsup also wants administrators to stop questioning students about what they post online. 

In the past month, two fake accounts have been created using the prefix "not," followed by names of a Northshore teacher, and an assistant principal. Students have tweeted comments either pretending to be those individuals, or criticizing them. 

The school district has been questioning students who "liked" some of those tweets. 

"Monitoring student Twitter accounts is inappropriate and an overstep of their duties as a public high school," Allsup said.

The Northshore School District told us it does not regularly monitor the social media accounts of students. It said the fake Twitter accounts that used staff names were "disruptive" to the educational process. 

They interviewed some students who "liked" the posts, as part of a school district investigation. Bothell police were also called, but so far a police captain said there's no evidence of a crime.