Imagine my surprise yesterday when ABC7 News reported that Chancellor Dennis Walcott had developed a set of social media guidelines for NYC Department of Education employees to follow. For the last seven years, I’ve run amok from what others might consider decency in social media (re: I curse a lot in other platforms). At first, when I got blocked from my private blog, I thought my swearing had put me over the proverbial edge of their sensitive Internet filter. Then, as I began to clean up my act on my eponymous platform, I noticed the filter was lifted for my sight. I win! That is, until my arguments became less curse-laden and more potent.
My site has been blocked since 2010, and I’m honored.
What people don’t see about social media policies is that there are so many exceptions to the rules that they often look sloppily put together, like a CYA umbrella policy from an era where even Bill Gates thought we wouldn’t need as much memory as we do for our hard drives. Like media who only report on the sordid relationships between (a miniscule amount of) teachers and students, teachers and other teachers, and teachers with … themselves. Like principals who don’t understand social media until someone sits them down and says, “When we tweet, we don’t have to actually whistle.” Like parents who don’t actually teach their kids how to interact with other people or with the devices they buy for them.
Like teachers who are any combination of these three.
The premise for social media guidelines seems like an attempt to curtail and dissuade people from using social media to even use it in a way that’s already ethical. People, thus, will likely fall into two camps: the “I’m not going to worry about what they’re talking about over there” or “Social media’s too dark a lane for me to even get to know so I won’t touch it.” The second crowd worries me the most because teachers have a great opportunity to place themselves firmly in the future of their own profession, guiding students in learning how to use the world’s information for more than connecting to friends.
Instead, the entire scene just reeks of regression. That’s why the future of education will take a brand of forward-thinking educator (teachers / principals etc.) with enough deft and savvy to advocate for technology use in the classroom and enough courage (for lack of a more appropriate word) to wrinkle the social media guidelines and them into the recycle bin.
Digitally and physically.
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
LOVE THIS POST! I’m applying to fellowship programs as we speak. I work as a tutor and I try to use as many tools as possible to help kids get things. Technology really works, but so does the old school candy or Pizza party bribe. Its really interesting to navigate.
I also have like a million social networking sites. and I have not yet censored myself… i hope i never have to.
I am right there with you Jose. I have “override the filter” rights (as well as courage, deft & savvy) and use them routinely to allow access to social media for my students. I open blogs, YouTube, FaceBook, Twitter, etc…I am a renegade.
I am “friends” with my students on FB who request it; they understand that by being friends with me, they will be subject to the digital citizenship and respect ethics I have taught them in class, and will call out all violations. I consider it my job to be a role model for online behavior (and that doesn’t mean I censor myself!). I have 200 student friends on FB. In over 3 years I have yet to see any genuinely mean, poor or dangerous behavior. Guess what they’re doing there? Helping each other. How is this a bad thing?
Hi Jose
While I like to regard myself as a responsible social media citizen & role model for my students and my community, in the sense that doing so often puts me at odds with general departmental and community opinion, I have been a renegade since I first discovered the communicative power of the WWW over a decade ago. I will continue to voice my opinion online. I will continue to ‘friend’ my students and their parents. I will continue to provide the same responsible role modeling and duty of care online as I do offline.
I’m pretty sure Will Richardson was on the right track when he likened the internet to a run away bus. There are no ground rules in social media and while adults continue to be prevented from joining kids in those spaces then the kids will continue to make up the rules as they go.
Keep up the good work :-)
Loved the blog! I encourage you to continue to push the bounds of learning!
Everyone,
Thanks for your responses. I’ve been musing on these guidelines some more, and wonder the implications of such a CYA policy in a time when schools of thought NEED to be at the forefront of teaching students how to think about the world around them, even if it’s coming at them faster than we ever could.