MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Miami Dade School Board met Wednesday to discuss the cyber attacks and other slowdowns that have been plaguing the district since it began its online learning platform Monday.
More law enforcement agencies are getting involved into investigating what and how the system was breached and who is responsible. The Federal Bureau of Investigation told Local 10 they are assisting Miami-Dade Schools Police. We’ve also learned that the United States Secret Service is involved.
“It’s something we have never dealt with, not only internally, but our local law enforcement partners haven’t either,” Commander Edwin Lopez, Miami-Dade School Police, said.
The district’s superintendent Alberto Carvalho said that some of the attacks came from outside of the United States. “We also know that some of these attacks came from local entities,” Carvalho said.
On Wednesday, it was also announced that teachers in Grades 6 through 12 will now have the ability to create their own classroom by way of Microsoft Teams. Teachers will be given autonomy so that they can run virtual classrooms in the way they see fit.
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During school board meetings, Carvalho and his staff were flooded with questions on what happened, what didn’t happen and what should have happened.
The conversation was not just about the cyber-attacks, but about the overall readiness of schools to reopen online.
School board member and Vice Chair Steve Gallon said the online experience was an utter failure.
“These are issues that manifested themselves not simply Monday. We’ve had some challenges relative to this particular platform as early as last week,” Gallon said.
There were also questions about the K-12 online platform itself and the $15.3 million contract.
“This was a missed opportunity for the board to lead on this particular issue and really to exercise its fiduciary responsibility and protect the taxpayer,” Gallon said.