The Port Townsend School District could soon join suit in a legal case against big tech, but the odds of winning appear to be slim.

Seattle Public Schools decided Friday, Jan. 6 to sue the tech giants behind TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, and Snapchat, claiming the social media companies are substantially contributing to the mental health crisis among America’s youth by targeting young people, designing algorithms to maximize kids’ use of the apps, putting profits over the mental health of children, and more.

The Kent School District, among other districts in the United States, have followed suit.

The Port Townsend School District’s board of directors met Feb. 2, discussing whether or not to join the lawsuit.

“This mental health crisis is directly impacting our educational communities, and there’s research to show that social media companies’ actions related to social media platforms are contributing to the mental health crisis, and excessive and problematic use of social media is harmful to children’s mental, behavioral, and emotional health,” Superintendent Linda Rosenbury said during the meeting.

The lawsuit is being led by the Franz Law Group, a firm the school district is familiar with.

“[It’s] the same group that did the lawsuit against Juul and Altria, and there is a settlement there that we should receive any day now of a dollar amount coming to the school to support us in responding to the vaping problem,” Rosenbury said.

The Port Townsend School District joined a lawsuit against Juul and Altria led by Franz Law Group in 2022, with the e-cigarette company agreeing to settle thousands of lawsuits for reportedly $1.2 billion.

This time around, the district isn’t sold on joining the social media suit.

“What I heard from my colleagues in other districts, is that this lawsuit, while it looks similar to the Juul lawsuit and has merit in that, yes, we all agree that social media companies have designed their tools to breed division and obsessive use, I don’t think we argue with that, [but] we’re not sure if there’s a precedent to win,” Rosenbury said.

“What some legal analysts have said is this is a long shot to win,” she added.

On the positive side, there’s no risk for the school district to join the suit, according to Rosenbury.

“There’s no financial risk to the district, but there will be approximately 25 hours of staff time required,” Rosenbury said.

While the item was for discussion only, Rosenbury offered her recommendation to the board, which was not to join based on limited staffing for data gathering as well as the unlikelihood of actually winning the case.

“People are leaning toward ‘no’ because of the legal analysis,” she said. “Small districts are not set up to join lawsuits like this, it feels. But large districts can invest resources and they have the staffing to do it.”

The district’s board of directors will vote on whether or not to join the suit in one of its upcoming meetings, which occur the first and third Thursday of each month.