The problems surrounding teachers using Facebook seem to be getting more and more complex. I’ve written before about how teacher’s private use of Facebook can impact their jobs, whether justly or unjustly.  The issue that was brought up recently involves teachers’ use of Facebook on private mobile devices during school hours.

This is a tricky issue.  We want teachers to be doing what they are paid to do – teach their classes and monitor their students.  But how do you keep this in check?

We have Facebook blocked in our district because of some of the discipline issues is creates with students.  It was suggested that we consider adding restrictions on Facebook usage on private mobile devices to our Acceptable Use Policy.  I flatly disagreed with that.  Our AUP regulates acceptable use of district-owned equipment and services, not private equipment.  I don’t think should or legally could use a policy written for district equipment to be applied to private equipment. (more…)

There’s a new website that’s been getting quite a bit of press lately.  It’s called “Please Rob Me,” and it scans Twitter updates for people who have indicated that they are somewhere other than at home.  The idea isn’t to enable thieves, but to highlight the carelessness of letting everyone know where you are every minute of the day.

I remember when location-aware applications were first taking off this caused me some concerns.  In 2006 I came across Tim Hibbard, a programmer who had written his own routine to update his location constantly on his blog using the GPS in his Blackberry.  Given such a constant data stream it should have been a no-brainer to figure out where he lived and when he wasn’t there.

Fast forward a few years and we now have applications like Google Latitude, BrightKite, and FourSquare which allow users to check-in with their GPS-enabled smart phones. Most of these services offer privacy settings so that the whole world doesn’t know your exact location, and all are user-activated so that there isn’t a constant tracking of your movements. You only check-in when you want to.

The idea behind these is that you would be able to see if your friends are nearby and could meet up with them. However, I’ve not seen that work very well. If I’m going to meet someone I usually call and confirm, or use some other communication method. I don’t rely on GPS enabled phones to happen upon someone. I guess if you had enough of your friends on the same service it would work. However, I rarely check in with Google Latitude, so it’s still showing me at my last location somewhere in Columbia. Potential burglars might be surprised if they are relying on my updates.

In reality, you don’t need a GPS-enabled smart phone to tip off potential burglars.  While it might help in finding the exact location of your house, all a thief really needs is a status update that reads something like, “I can’t wait until I’m on vacation in the Bahamas next week!”  While that’s OK, just make sure you don’t provide them with enough personal information to take advantage of that tidbit.

Tips for prevention social-networking burglary from Kim Kommando

What’s the buzz, tell me what’s a-happenin’,
What’s the buzz, tell me what’s a-happenin’,
What’s the buzz, tell me what’s a-happenin’,
What’s the buzz, tell me what’s a-happenin’,

Why should you want to know?
Don’t you mind about the future?
Don’t you try to think ahead?
Save tomorrow for tomorrow;
Think about today instead.

- “What’s the Buzz?” from Jesus Christ Superstar by Andrew Lloyd Webber

Back in the Good Ol’ Days™, AOL had dominance in the online world.  It started as a self-contained entity with its own news, shopping, and social interactions.  The “Internet” was this other stuff that you had to pay extra to get to on a per minute basis, unless you purchased AOL’s more expensive unlimited plan.  In fact, less savvy users often thought that AOL WAS the Internet, and couldn’t imagine accessing information through any other method.  Browser?  What’s a browser?

Fast forward a decade or so and we like to think we’re so much better off with so many options, especially within the realm of searching and social networking.  However, there’s much evidence today’s social networking corporations have the same attitudes as AOL did.  They only want you to play in their sandbox.

Bing

Let’s start alphabetically with Bing.com.  While not a social networking site, they have inherited all of the exclusivity of their parent company, Microsoft.  They have even invented their own malady, Search Engine Overload, to scare others toward their “decision” engine.”  I think what sent me over the edge was when I tried to install their Bing 3D Maps, supposedly their answer to Google Earth.  I go the following message:

Make Bing my default search engine and prevent other programs from interfering with my choice.

If I had checked that box I would have been locked into Bing permanently, I guess.  The second part of that statement, “interfering with my choice,” is deliberately misleading.  If you click this box, you have no choice. (more…)

Yesterday there was an article in the Greenville News about development of a policy for teacher use of Facebook. The article stated that the board was holding off on approval of the policy because some members had raised “ethical, legal and technical questions.”    The new policy would put into place a procedure for dismissing teachers for improper behavior in social networking sites.

According to the policy,  teachers “should recognize that they are being continuously observed by students, other employees, parents, and community members, and that their actions and demeanor may impair their effectiveness as an employee.”  It goes on to state the following:

The personal life of an employee including the employee’s personal use of non-district issued electronic equipment outside of working hours (such as through social networking sites and personal portrayal on the Internet), will be the concern of and warrant the attention of the board if it impairs the employee’s ability to be an effective teacher, effectively perform his/her job responsibilities, or if it violates local, state, or federal law or contractual agreements.

That phrase “impairs the employee’s ability to be an effective teacher” is the bit that gets me.  It was used by one of my counterparts in another district over a lunch discussion about this same issue.  The phrase is overly broad, and open to interpretation.  If a one parent takes offense at something I’ve posted, does that meet the criteria?  I have experienced first hand some of these dangers, and I know that it’s possible to make the wrong decision and wreck someone’s career for no reason.

I’m not talking about things that are obviously wrong, such as drug use or illegal activities.  I’m talking about teachers getting in trouble for normal adult activity.  Take, for example, the case of Ashley Payne.  The Appalachee High School teacher from Winder, Georgia posted the following photo on Facebook…

The photo was taken while Payne was on vacation and posted on a supposedly private portion of Facebook.  Elsewhere on her site she mentioned “Going to Bitch BINGO,” the name of a game played at an Atlanta restaurant.  A parent complained, and this was enough to get her fired – one photo of the teacher with a beer in her hand while on vacation and one word that caused offense.

Last year my Facebook profile photo was my infamous “Santa Martini” photo…

I was told by another one of my counterparts that I would have been fired in her district.  The “effectiveness as an employee” clause would have been invoked.  I’m sure that I’ve used language just as offensive on this blog as the unfortunate teacher above used.  Fortunately, no one has said anything about this blog or the photo as to either being amiss or diminishing my ability to teach.

However, my situation is a bit different.  As a district administrator I’m less likely to have a kid who’s curious about their teacher Google me.  Children (and parents) are naturally interested in their teachers, and want to find out about them.  And sometimes it can have unfortunate consequences.

Here’s another example of leaping to conclusions – a case in which I was directly involved, and I was able to prevent some problems.  I received a complaint about that a teacher had inappropriate material on his Facebook page.  This was a well-respected, veteran teacher, and I had a hard time believing this to be true.  I checked out the page (which was NOT set to private), and there was a picture of a young lady, a student, with her skirt hiked up indecently high and showing her legs with colorful stockings.

On the face of it, this was incriminating.  However, there was more to the story.  The young lady was proud of her silly, colorful stockings and was showing them off for one of her friends.  The friend took a photo with her cell phone, then uploaded the photo to HER Facebook account.  Somewhere in the background of the show you could see the teacher’s left foot.  The student tagged the foot as with the teacher’s name, causing the photo to show up on his profile.  The teacher had nothing to do with it, and was even unaware that his name was associated with the photo.

In this case I recommended to the teacher than he not friend his students.  In fact, this is what we recommend in general for our teachers.  Unlike Greenville County, we currently have no plans to make this into policy.  Our district even allows some leeway when students are family friends, or are related to teachers.

When I do workshops on blogging and social networking I always tell teachers to be circumspect in what they post, because it may come back to haunt them.  However, in the case of our teacher, he was an innocent bystander who had unfortunately friended his students.  I can see this happening more and more, though, and I blame digital cameras.

People don’t share photos in print format anymore.   Online photos galleries are the most common way to share vacation photos, etc.  Someone may take a photo of a young teacher at the lake or beach in a bathing suit and post it online, or take a picture of a teacher with a drink in their hand, and some parent may find that offensive.  So what’s one to do?  Completely abandon any online life, or just make sure than no photos of them are ever taken?

I’m really glad that the Greenville County School Board decided to take a step back.   The line between public and private lives gets blurred with everything now being online, and there is really no going back.    Some members of the board have recognized that teachers have rights, and that they can’t/shouldn’t try to control all teacher behavior.   I’m glad our district has also come to that conclusion, and I just wished that other districts were as enlightened.

Well, that didn’t take long.  By 5:00 PM DARPA had already announced a winner in their 2009 Challenge.  The challenge was supposed to last through December 14, but it was obvious from early on that it wouldn’t take that much time.  As shown on the map above, the balloons were located in places where it would have been hard to miss them (although there is a large wedge of the Midwest with no ballooons.)  The winner was the team from MIT.

I didn’t participate in the challenge as I thought I might.  However, I did check in on the progress from time-to-time on Twitter.  It was interesting to watch the competition progress.  Most of the Twitter traffic seemed to be from those involved in the hunt, and I saw only one from someone that seemed to have honestly stumbled upon one (…sort of, but more on that in a bit.)

As I saw reports of balloons I wondered if I shouldn’t try to find the location and report them as my own.  However, I figured that if the reports were THAT public, then others would have reported them.  I just decided to watch the spectacle. (more…)