Police: Pa. mom changed her kids' grades

Parents Forum
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<p>"A Pennsylvania woman allegedly changed her children’s grades after logging into a school computer system using passwords obtained when she worked for the district.</p>

<p>Investigators say Catherine Venusto used the Northwestern Lehigh School District superintendent’s password to change the grades. She was arraigned Wednesday on a half-dozen felony counts and released on bail." …</p>

<p>Half a dozen felonies. Geez.</p>

<p>[News</a> from The Associated Press](<a href=“http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_MOM_HACKS_SCHOOL?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-07-19-07-34-23]News”>http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_MOM_HACKS_SCHOOL?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-07-19-07-34-23)</p>

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<p>She is alleged to have changed one of the grades from a 98 to a 99…Sounds like she must have read a few threads on this site and decided the 98 wasn’t good enough…Just kidding, sort of…no, not really.</p>

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<p>I assumed it was because she wanted the kid to be valedictorian.</p>

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<p>This is a reason why IT departments insist on expiring passwords. There’s no reason why a 2 year old password should still be valid.</p>

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<p>Wow. I thought I was a helicopter parent…</p>

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<p>jandjdad… my sentiments, exactly.</p>

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<p>You have the right username for it.</p>

<p>It wasn’t a crime in the good, old days.</p>

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<p>Regarding 98 to 99, I think there must a cliff in grade. Why change if it does not make any difference?</p>

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Oh well, don’t worry about ethics as long as you don’t think it’s illegal!</p>

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<p>It’s not illegal, really?</p>

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<p>Apparently the school district didn’t FIRE her for this. She still works in some other division. Can you believe that? (Makes you wonder what else she did while working for the school district – did she read your child’s file for example?)</p>

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<p>As far as legality goes, there was a time when there weren’t laws against hacking. I think that it was back in the late 1980s or early 1990s when the company that I worked for essentially put [no trespassing] signs on the welcome pages on their systems.</p>

<p>That’s kind of like property owners having to put No Hunting signs on their property.</p>

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<p>User name was no accident, Eagle.</p>

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The key word is that she didn’t ‘think’ it was illegal. Since she’s now charged with multiple infractions it clearly is illegal (assuming she gets convicted).</p>

<p>But she did ‘think’ it was unethical but apparently that aspect didn’t bother her.</p>

15

<p>She also altered her daughter’s grade.

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