John Miller, president of the Marshall County Board of Education, leads this week’s meeting during which the board signed a contract for legal services related to a national class action lawsuit against social media companies. (File Photo/Shelley Hanson)

MOUNDSVILLE – By joining a national class action lawsuit against social media companies, the Marshall County Board of Education hopes to garner possible related funds in the future.

The board recently approved joining the lawsuit being pursued by Grossman and Kelly and the Bullock Legal Group. The board signed a legal services contract that states it agrees to retain the law firms “in the prosecution of all claims against all responsible parties in the Social Media Adolescent Addiction/Personal Injury Products Liability Litigation and Video Game Addiction matters.”

“The plaintiffs of the suit would be individuals or school districts who claim companies are harming students or children because social media has a negative impact on mental health,” Superintendent Shelby Haines said of the suit’s claims.

She noted the allegations are that social media has a lack of adequate protections and that students younger than 18 are easily susceptible to its harms.

“Marshall County Schools uses social media, but we are conservative in our use of social media. We use it as a platform to disperse information to the community,” she added.

The district, she added, has been working with local lawyer Jeremy McGraw, who is serving as a liaison between the school system and the multi-district national class action lawsuit.

Haines said if the district garners any money from the lawsuit it would be used to bolster its current methods of filtering out inappropriate content on students’ school computer devices, such as iPads.

“We have three different applications we use in Marshall County Schools to monitor students’ internet use and activity,” she said, adding the applications filter content and also provide an email alert to the school if any inappropriate content is reached.

If the suit is successful it could help the district.

“Just like many other class action lawsuits … if there is an outcome in which the companies are deemed responsible, that could afford the school system compensation in paying for filters and apps that we can use to continue monitoring students,” Haines said. “And assist in the mental health services we provide.”