This week seemed to cover a wide variety of topics from when and who to tag, what happens when we have been tagged, how we present ourselves and how that can be seen as narcissistic, ethical issues that arise when using technology, the laws that technology policies are trying to uphold and how they might be failing that.
Tagging to exclude someone or purposely embarrass them hadn't occurred to me, though I am vigilant to either not tag people when I post pictures or to make sure I have checked first. I recently visited friends who have made a conscience effort to not have their daughter online. As I wanted to post pictures about my trip they said she could be in the picture, but not to tag them in it so that it wasn’t connected to their daughter. That seemed like a reasonable request and one that I was happy to comply with.
Understanding what digital citizenship is seems to be the first step in creating a policy that will work. This video from Common Sense Education is a quick snapshot that introduces the idea of digital citizenship.
Enforcing technological use policies seems to be consistently ineffective. This is possibly due to poor writing that make them so vague they are basically not enforceable. I think the policies should have enough details to express what they are trying to cover and have specifics of what is and is not acceptable with appropriate consequences provided. The policy for my current school (Middle School Student Handbook, 2017) actually does have details for what is expected and not and has some consequences, though I don’t think the consequences are ever enforced. This makes the policy as ineffective as the very vague ones my peers have found.
I found a blog about the difficulty in reading privacy policies for apps and software online. It mentions that often these documents are written at a reading level that is much too high for the average person. Although I am not sure that school policies are written in the same way, they may be too high of a reading level for the full student body it represents. The blog suggests ways that parents can be more successful with the policy wording and suggestions for companies when writing the policies. These suggestions could be used by schools when they are writing their policies as well.
I like the idea of having high school students help create the policy as well as creating further pieces to go with the policy to help explain it to younger students, as was suggested by the Office of the Educational Technology. This would create more student buy-in as well as help with the language that was relatable to all. I think the students should be part of a partnership with teachers, administration and board officials so that all parts that need to be represented in the policy including legalities are covered.
Common Sense Education. (2017). What is digital citizenship? [website]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbbuLFUSd0A
Dubai American Academy Middle School. (September 2017). Middle School Student Handbook. Retrieved from http://media.gemseducation.com/media/37113/middle_school_student_handbook_-_2017-18.pdf
Lee, I. (2018, July 17). It’s not you; privacy policies are difficult to read. [blog]. Retrieved from https://www.commonsense.org/education/blog/its-not-you-privacy-policies-are-difficult-to-read
Office of Educational Technology. (n.d.). Student-centered acceptable use policy. Retrieved from https://tech.ed.gov/stories/student-centered-acceptable-use-policy/
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