NYC’s new education guidelines to restrict teacher and student contact via social media websites

We’re sure that some of you guys have pretty good relationships with your teachers and might even have them on Facebook. Unfortunately if that’s one of ways that you and your teacher keep in contact socially or academically, that could soon change thanks to New York City’s Education Department. The Education Department has since released a set of guidelines that will not allow teachers to communicate with students through their personal pages on social networking websites, such as Facebook or Twitter.

Instead if teachers wanted to communicate with students on the internet via social media, they will have to communicate via pages set up specifically for classroom use. The reason behind this move is apparently due to dozens of teachers over the years having been investigated, or even fired, due to inappropriate behavior with students that was conducted via social media websites. The new set of guidelines will also prohibit teachers from emailing, “friending”, or otherwise communicating with students from their personal pages.

The new pages set up for classroom use will pertain to information about homework, study guides and must be approved by a supervisor before being set up. Parents will also have to sign a consent form that allows their child to participate on those pages as well. While it might sound like a good idea to prevent inappropriate behavior or potential abuse, not everyone sees it that way. According to Ms Chiara Colletti, a spokeswoman for the principals’ union, “We are concerned that our principals will be expected to bear the burden of monitoring social media activities that are, in fact, almost impossible to monitor.”

What do you guys think?

Tyler Lee
Categories: Web
Tags: Education, Facebook, Twitter