Because I am a teacher, I keep my identity secret. Tenure doesn’t exist down here in Texas, so I can be terminated at the end of any contract. I’d hate to think that my blogging could be the cause, so I have cut the cards to make sure it doesn’t – I rarely blog about school, and very few school folks know about the site. I don’t want this blog to ever be an employment issue.

But when you have horrendous events involving teachers, and online statements that do send warning signs about possible inappropriate or unprofessional behavior, there will be suggestions that the online conduct of teachers be monitored as a condition of employment.

Until now, schools have been mostly concerned with policing computer usage on campus.

But a veteran educator said Monday that the episode could jar schools to sleuth more into online behavior of teachers.

"I wouldn't hire him," said William Rebore, chairman of the department of educational leadership at St. Louis University and a former superintendent for the Francis Howell and Valley Park school districts.

"If the person said, 'Oh, that's nothing, it's just a joke,' well, professional people don't joke in that manner, especially when it comes to children."

Rebore said he thinks schools will more commonly ask employees to disclose what they are posting on the Internet.

A job application could ask, "Do you have a Web site? Are you featured in any Web site?" Rebore said. "Certainly, if someone were not honest about that, it could be grounds for termination. It wouldn't surprise me if districts started putting that on an application."

I can understand wanting to make sure that teachers are not giving off warning signes of nascent pedophilia. I accept that schools might not want to have a teacher who has her own internet porn site. But do we really want teachers – who are, after all, protected by the First Amendment – to be judged by their public employers based upon what they write online? Would blogging – or at least blogging that doesn’t conform to a supervisor or school board member’s point of view -- become grounds for termination. Would edublogging be a thing of the past? Indeed, would our underage students have greater rights to online freedom of speech than their adult teachers?

How do we strike the balance between civil liberties and student safety?

Posted by: Greg at 12:41 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 411 words, total size 3 kb.

1 pozzo.. che cosa posso dire.. luogo piacevole, buon stile, lo gradisco

Posted by: Calciomercato at Fri May 26 04:03:58 2006 (WMCQi)

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