EASTHAMPTON — After discovering “suspicious activity” the Easthampton School Department shut down all online systems.
In a statement released on Oct. 7, the department said, “The City of Easthampton’s School District (“School District”) recently discovered suspicious activity within its network environment. We immediately shut down all online systems as a precaution and are currently working with a team of forensic experts to investigate and assist with bringing systems back online.”
The statement continued, “We apologize for the operational disruption, but we have reverted to manual coordination methods and school remains in session.”
“We recognize the significance of this event and have quickly taken the appropriate steps to address it. Our comprehensive assessment is ongoing. Please rest assured that we are committed to sharing more information as soon as it becomes available,” the statement concluded.
Easthampton Public Schools did not return a request for comment by press time.
Superintendent Michelle Balch on Oct. 8 told Reminder Publishing the investigation into the suspicious activity identified on Oct. 5 was still ongoing.
“Based on what we knew at the time, we immediately contacted our cyber insurance company to make sure that we had the resources at our disposal before we took any additional action on our servers. The following day we had the scope of work and the experts starting to do a forensic audit of our system,” Balch said, adding that work remains ongoing and the district will not restore access to servers until the review is complete and they are confident that any identified network issues have been appropriately addressed.
Balch explained that families and staff were notified of the ongoing situation by Tuesday. Staff meetings at both Easthampton High School and Mountain View School were held on Oct. 6 to provide staff with information about the incident, answer questions and review the next steps before sharing an update with the broader school community.
“While cybersecurity incidents have become increasingly common nationwide, we take this event seriously and have moved quickly to address it. Our comprehensive assessment is ongoing, and we are committed to sharing additional information as it becomes available,” Balch stated in the letter to the district. “Our priority is to safely restore the systems that support teaching, learning, communication, and daily school operations. Easthampton Public Schools remains fully committed to protecting the information in our care, strengthening the security of our systems and safeguarding data privacy.”
While still under investigation, the district’s primary method of communication with families ParentSquare is still active, but service inside of schools can be inconsistent. Wednesday the district was also able to make additional progress in supporting school operations while the network is down, including access to several copiers within schools.
“We’re doing attendance, all of our record keeping on paper,” Balch said. “Thankfully we have access to a lot of paper files still here in the district. The staff has been incredible. They just have to teach differently and adapt for instruction and they have.”
Balch expressed gratitude to Springfield Public Schools, which offered a significant helping hand by providing the district with eight high-powered wireless modems. These devices are providing additional internet access for staff and help restore access to important web-based teaching and learning platforms while the district’s network remains offline.
“It was awesome to be lent a helping hand by Springfield in our time of need when they weren’t using them anymore. They sent Verizon over to drop the modems off to us so we could have internet access,” Balch added. “Unfortunately it’s something everybody has to be prepared for. I think every school district, and even businesses, have to be prepared for these types of incidents.”
Springfield schools also dealt with a cyberattack in September.
School remains in session and Balch added staff members continue to find creative ways to support students and one another while the district operates with limited technology access with the network down.
“We’re a smaller district so thankfully communication was a little bit easier. We were able to still continue to access our ParentSquare messenger which was really vital for communication. And then making sure our safety precautions were in place, like our doors continue to be locked and our nursing staff having the information they needed,” Balch said.
Balch reiterated much gratitude to staff and the entire school community for its grace, flexibility and understanding shown through the situation. She added the district will continue to provide daily updates as this work progresses.
This is a developing story, and Reminder Publishing will provide more information as it becomes available, both in the print edition as well as at thereminder.com.
Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to include comments from Easthampton Superintendent Michelle Balch.
