Student Online Safety Responsibility

Whose responsibility is it to teach students to be safe online?

Is that question really any different from the question: Whose responsibility is it to teach students to be safe? Some will probably say the answer is the healthy, happy family. Others will say it takes a village to educate a child. Families will differ in how able they are to teach their children about online safety. So will teachers for that matter, unless they are specialists or at least frequent users of the internet. Technology teachers should by definition be internet specialists, but safety should be the responsibility of the user or teacher who asks students to use the internet. Victims and former, repentant online bullies/criminals could serve as traveling lecturers, much the same way that former addicts or convicts are used to teach students about drugs and crime. Perhaps consultants will pop up to meet this need in schools. To some extent, the media teaches about online safety when it publishes or reports a story. Ultimately, many parties do or could take responsibility, but by no means should the opportunity be missedto teach about it in school.

Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?

Online safety is covered directly in a section on social networking. Interestingly, the AUP states that social networking online safety is a personal responsibility. The AUP makes references to university applications, job searches, and overall reputation. All of these are valid, but perhaps still a bit abstract for 6-8th graders.

Online safety is also covered throughout the AUP in sections on internet use, school computer use, school network use, etc. The most basic reference to safety is regarding the privacy of passwords. There are discussions of viruses and improper web pages. In short, online safety is covered through numerous channels in ISBs AUP.