Smart glasses present schools with a complicated challenge. The same camera-equipped eyewear that raises legitimate concerns about privacy, consent, recording, and academic integrity may also help a visually impaired student read a worksheet, identify an object, or understand their surroundings. As schools develop smart glasses policies, we need to distinguish between misuse and meaningful accessibility, because sometimes the risk is also the accommodation.

What happens when a camera no longer needs to be pulled from a student’s pocket because it’s already sitting on their face? Camera-equipped glasses that once cost hundreds of dollars are now appearing for under $100, making discreet recording technology increasingly accessible to youth. As students return to school this fall, we examine why wearable cameras raise important questions about privacy, consent, academic integrity, and school policy.

Over nearly three decades, Darren has witnessed four distinct evolutions of online vulnerability, from AOL and social media to smartphones and artificial intelligence. Yet through every technological shift, one truth has remained constant: technology changes, but human vulnerabilities endure. The future of online safety may depend less on controlling every new technology and more on strengthening something no algorithm can replace, the human element.