I often write about the goings on here in my little suburban hometown. You know cutesy little things, holiday parades, local theater and all that great stuff. But our town is not without it’s drama and Lifetime Movie worthy news worthy items. And boy, this week we had a doozy.
A 40-year-old high school teacher (not my old high school, but the high school on the other side of town, which may not matter to you people in the big city, but other small town folks will understand why that distinction needs to be made) was arrested when she arrived to work on 24 felony counts alleging that she sexually assaulted a 14-year-old male student from December 2010 to May 2011. She has since admitted to all charges.
Gossip and debates in out community ran rapid via our local small-town news sites and of course via Facebook. While most people assumed she was guilty (a 1.83 million dollar bail was a pretty string indicator that the police had pretty string evidence against her) there were quite a lot of people supporting her, claiming the charges were false (mainly former students) though the debate was laid to rest once she admitted guilt.
But it still got me thinking.
Based on the new articles I read it’s my understanding that the relationship started out on Facebook and via texting and playing words with friends. Though I guess she had been friends with many of her students on Facebook. This is now forcing our district to examine its rules on teacher/students social media friendships.
Many districts and states around the country have already taken serious measures in preventing these kinds of lines from being crossed. Like in Salt Lake City or in Missouri and many other districts across the nation.
Now, of course, I don’t think social media websites are the cause of this horrible situation, but I do believe that this teacher being friends with her students Facebook and playing online games certainly added a catalytic effect to the situation that ended up shattering the lives of two families and crushing the views of the students who looked up to this woman.
The lesson here, as parents anyway, is that even the most amazing and wonderful teachers can turn out to be a danger to our kids. Which is why we need to be involved in our kids online lives. We need to be aware and we need to ask questions when things don’t seem right. From early on we need to explain the dos and don’ts of being online–and a big fat DON’T is being Facebook friends with your teachers.
Even more importantly ALL school districts should be setting strict social media guidelines to help protect both kids AND teachers. After all, there must be plenty of innocent teachers out there who are friends with their students in a completely harmless way, yet leave themselves open up to false accusations and situations that can easily be avoided by simply not friending students.
But I guess even the strictest social media policies and rules aren’t going to stop the Mark Kay Letourneau’s of the world from taking advantage of young kids. And the strictest policy here in our district won’t give back that boyhood what was taken from him; it won’t give him or his parents the rest of his childhood back. It won’t give her own husband and children their mom back. And it won’t give all her disenfranchised and hurt students their favorite teacher back.
Despite the pain and sadness of this situation, lets learn from it! How do you now or plan to help your children make wise choices online? How do you stay involved in their social lives without being overbearing?
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{ 26 comments }
First – totally agree that FB and similar sites aren't the cause. (Kind of like FB involved with a lot of divorce cases now – it may make it easier to form that bond, but it's not the cause.)
For our family, we educate about online friends, chats, and so on. Since we have an elementary aged kid, it's a bit easier to handle that. We keep a pretty good eye on online interactions whether through games or chats. We make sure our kid is able to make wise decisions, and when it comes time, we'll work our way up gradually until our kid can be trusted to make wise decisions about online interactions. We'll also keep an eye on their FB page and other interactions as much as possible. At some point, we'll need to let go so we'd rather that she be ready for that time than just dumped in all at once.
You know, I am not even friends with my daughter's teacher online on facebook. I send her emails concerning things, but I wish to keep my life and my daughters life apart from her teachers. My daughter is still young, she is six and in the first grade, so I do not have to deal with this yet. But in the future, I believe in drawing the line and saying no, you will not have your teachers as friends. Do we really know people?
I totally agree that limits need to be set regarding the online interactions between students and teachers and that parents need to be aware of what their kids are doing online. We haven't had to deal with this yet, though, since out son is only 2. I think having the computer in a common area like the living room is a good way to keep an eye on what your kids are doing online, but ultimately I think you just have to raise them to know the difference between right and wrong and build a trusting relationship and hope that they make the right decisions and are able to come to you for help when they don't.
I definitely agree with your thoughts. Your blog provided us with valuable information to work with. Each and every thoughts of your post are awesome.
Teachers should not be friends with students on facebook and visa versa.
Thanks for this post — I think it's really important. Kids are so into social media that we as parents have to teach them the cautions they must take! Mary J.
Keyloggers on the computer. Let the children make their own decisions but keep a close eye on what they're doing online, without every actually standing over their shoulder
I feel that student-teacher online friendships are somewhat inappropriate. It may be fine AFTER they stop being teacher and student. I had a horrible experience in my freshman year of college when my lab teacher (he was a young man working for the college and getting his phd) requested me on FB when the term ended. I stupidly went to hang out with him one day because I felt he didn't know many people around there and was lonely, and I ended up getting pretty invaded. I imagine the same thing could happen with younger people because they don't recognize, or ignore, warning signs. When my daughter grows up I will try to have a close relationship with her so she shares a lot of stuff with me, and I can look out for stuff like this.
Thanks for such a nice post . I must agree with your thoughts.
My oldest son was just allowed to get a Facebook page and he is in his Senior year of high school. Before he opened the account my husband and I had several talks with him about who can can "friend" and what types of things are appropriate and inappropriate to post there. We explained how privacy settings there don't ensure privacy and that anything you post is there forever, even if you take it off.
In response to your article, I do not think kids and teachers should be friends on any social media website. Like another poster said, even I am not a friend of my kids teachers.
I believe the relationship between students and teachers should be professional. That does not include being "friends" on social media. Teachers, like parents, are authority figures to their students and on a different social level from friends.
I plan to talk to my kids about who to add and who not to add. I always tell them to NEVER add anyone that they personally haven't met in person or are friends with. I try to explain to them the dangers of social media so that they don't get into trouble themselves
It's very difficult, but I'm probably a little on the overbearing side. Interesting article.
This wouldn't even be an issue in our home. Our children are not allowed on computers. We didn't have them or need them when we were growing up and neither do they. They can get their own computer when they are adults and out on their own like we did.
wow, creepy! My nieces are 7 and 9 and they pretty much only play a few games on the computer (and they watch cat videos!)
I'm sure my sister will be very strict about usage and having all passwords for quite a long time once they get started with email and social media.
My daughter is 17 and has a FB page. I am on her friends list and monitor her page and who her friends are. She also has an email that I have a password to and she knows I check in. I have raised her with a knowledge of all things on the internet..the bad and the good. We have a lot of discussions about what to watch for and the mistakes her friends make. Posting phone numbers on FB and myspace? Completely out of the question but her friends do it all the time. She knows what is allowed and what isn't. I email back and forth with her teachers all the time but we are not friends and they are not friends with her on FB either.
I believe that it is crucial for parents to monitor their children on FB and other social media sites.
I like that students/teachers can interact on facebook when it comes to helping with school projects, but anything else is strange.
I don't think students and teachers should be friends on facebook. It's used for socializing and teachers and students don't need to socialize together. Emailing questions to your teachers is fine, but not facebook.
Teachers and kids being friends on FB is a double edged-sword. On one hand, I realize that student/teacher relationship is compromised when is moves to more of a friendship status. However, kids often post things on FB that they will not voice publicly and not all parents monitor their kids FB accounts. Often, a child can be having issues and this will surface on FB, but everyone at school thinks that that particular child is fine. If the teachers or even one teacher were seeing these things on FB, the child might get the help that he/she needs before things are too far gone. I know this as a parent who caught something going on with my childs classmate. I finally spoke to someone at the school and she had no idea that things were even bad for this particular child.
We'll any kids underage should seriously have parent supervise them and their activity on the computer, Its not smart at all for any teacher to add their students to their social media web page, Just because stuff like that does happen! And its not even worth the risk, Im still young but i have never added any of my teachers to my Social Page… That is just very disturbing and i dont want them in my personal buissness and in my life.. Thats why their is a age limit on who your children can view and see in the security settings in most of the sites! I always used them when i was younger to make sure no one over 21 or 18 would be showing up as a suggested friend or someone that i might have known… And to just keep people from viewing my profile.
As a former teacher of high school students, I always ignored the requests of current students on fb. Once I moved out of the district and the students had graduated- I had no problems adding them then if I wanted to- and if I saw things I didn't like- they were deleted. You don't HAVE to be friends with them.
great article. online is everywhere it's would be pointless to contain it, but we help our kids talk to them, teach them, be patience & listen as well, we do have a time limit to their online time, it is secured and they know it as well, I ask for their password it may not be privacy for them but it's does work both ways they want to have online time and I want them to be safe, also working with their teachers knowing what they are doing and teaching our kids and helpful articles like this that brings attention to very important issues.
As with all new technology, it is important to establish rules and etiquette of what is ok and what not. This article is part of that process, and we as parents must be aware of what is going on so we can teach our children how to propelry use the new media.
There should be a fine line between a teacher and student relationship. FB can not be the blame for inappropriate actions. It goes back to this statement: People kill people, not guns.
For our family, we need to educate about online friends, chats, and so on. Since we have an elementary aged kid, it's a bit easier to handle that. We keep a pretty good eye on online interactions whether through games or chats. We make sure our kid is able to make wise decisions, and when it comes time, we'll work our way up gradually until our kid can be trusted to make wise decisions about online interactions.