I've been asked about that more than once, given that I rarely have blogged about events at school, and never in a manner that identifies students or explcitly identifies where I teach (a couple of posts have made it possible to identify the school, but you would have to click a link or do some research). And I have steadfastly refused to explcitly state my last name on the blog, precisely so I never have to deal with outraged students, parents, and peers -- though a little bit of ingenuity would allow an interested reader to ferret out my identity.

Why do I approach blogging this way? Well, it might have something to do with avoiding a situation like this one in Chicago.

Typing rambling screeds in an anonymous blog he called "Fast Times at Regnef High," a Fenger High School teacher unleashed his frustration over the chaos he saw around him.

He labeled his students "criminals," saying they stole from teachers, dealt drugs in the hallways, had sex in the stairwells, flaunted their pregnant bellies and tossed books out windows. He dismissed their parents as unemployed "project" dwellers who subsist on food stamps, refuse to support their "baby mommas" and bad-mouth teachers because their no-show teens are flunking.

He took swipes at his colleagues, too--"union-minimum" teachers, literacy specialists who "decorate their office door with pro-black propaganda," and security officers whose "loyalty is to the hood, not the school."

In his blog, the teacher did not identify himself or his students, the exact name of his school or the city where he taught. But like most bloggers, he wanted an audience, so he wrote in his blog that he had leaked news of his site to a few co-workers. Soon enough, the 30-year-old teacher's name was the talk of the school.

This week, after returning from spring break, the students read how they were depicted and flamed the blog with profane threats and righteous indignation toward the teacher.

By Thursday, the reaction grew so vitriolic that the blogger took down his site from Blogger.com. Also that day, a Fenger High teacher e-mailed his principal that he wasn't coming to school because he "feared for his safety." The teacher was the same one widely believed to have authored the blog because he told two colleagues that it was his, Fenger Principal William Johnson said.

Johnson said he doesn't know whether the teacher has resigned. The teacher hasn't returned Johnson's phone calls or replied to an e-mail asking to meet with him. The teacher did not acknowledge to the principal that it was his blog, but Johnson said he has no doubt, based on the writing style and his disappearance after the students named him in their postings. When he started the blog in February, he wrote as if he were the "brick and mortar" building named "Regnef,"--Fenger spelled backward--but then switched his voice and revealed he was a teacher.

In his final posting Thursday, the teacher said he intentionally leaked his blog site to people he knew would "tell the world" because he wanted it to be read, but he didn't explain how he expected to remain anonymous.

Now let's be honest -- this course of action was stupid. Once he started publicizing the blog at school, he was screwed. I have a couple of peers that know this is my blog, but they are folks who know to keep the matter extremely confidential because I've told them flat out that I don't want it to be known as my blog.

After posting stuff like he has, how can this guy possibly go back to Fenger High School.

Heck, how can he possibly remain in Chicago Public Schools?

He has enraged kids, parents, and colleagues -- he is toast.

I don't want to be him -- and so I keep my blogging separate from my place of employment.

And thank God I cannot access my site from school, so the temptation to post during school hours is not even there.

Posted by: Greg at 01:07 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 687 words, total size 4 kb.