According to administration, Pascack Valley is using a new streaming platform named Swank for the rest of the school year. Swank will help the school avoid problems with streaming services and potential legal issues while giving the school access to hundreds of movies in one place.

“[Swank is] a home base for videos and movies,” Thomas Gallione, Pascack Valley Assistant Principal, said.

The platform Swank includes 200 movies and TV shows that are commonly used in curriculums and also allows for 200 additional titles of the school’s choice to be added.

“A teacher [can make] a request [for a movie], the supervisor approves it, and then it’s available [in the school’s library],” Paul Zeller, Pascack Valley Regional High School District’s Director of Technology and Communication, said.

Streaming services have had issues with large gatherings watching together, which was one of the reasons that prompted the school to adopt the platform.

“Technically, as a school, we’re allowed to [show movies in class], but the streaming services don’t allow for it,” Zeller said. “So, if [without Swank] we own a library of 500 videos, we’re legally allowed to do it, but the streaming services don’t allow for large group gatherings [like clubs or classes].”

Outside of the classroom, there are other steps that need to be taken for showing films or shows to groups.

According to Gallione, if the school is going to have a movie fundraiser, the school is supposed to have approval from the producers and creators of the movie. “[Swank] is another way to make sure we have all of our digital citizenship kind[s] of thing[s] in line,” Gallione said.

Swank is currently being used throughout the entire district. Each teacher has their own login for Swank; it is not yet known if students will be given logins.

Zeller explained that there have been some initial issues with Swank at PV, but they’ve been worked through.

“It’s gonna take time, and there’s gonna be bumps in the road. It’s not going to have every single film or movie that everyone’s used to showing,” Gallione said. “But I think like anything, [it will] develop, and it’ll keep growing.”