Since the October 15 conviction of two girls for aggravated stalking, which led 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick's suicide, the debate over the legality and necessity of online surveillance of students has once again become a popular topic of debate.
In the past, the administration's job was simply to make sure that students behaved themselves on campus grounds. However, with the widespread use of social media as an emotional outlet for many students, educators are now having trouble walking the fine line between maintaining their students' right to free speech and keeping their students safe.
In recent court cases, students have been suspended and jailed for their pictures and online posts. In Nevada, a 16-year-old was sentenced to 31 days in jail and a 90-day suspension from school for bragging online about having guns and planning to kills students on a specific date. He sued the school district for violating his first amendment rights, but the Ninth Circuit of Appeals dismissed his claim. On the other hand, courts in Indiana ruled that two students' online photos were simply "crude humor" as opposed to "substantial disruption."
Do you think school administrators are justified in tracking their students' online actions? If so, where should they draw the line between students' free speech rights and maintaining the safety of their schools? Is legal action justified? What constitutes "substantial disruption"?
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I can’t imagine how difficult this position must be for schools. The aspect of this debate that most concerns me is the role of parents. I imagine that a large percent of cyberbullying occurs at home, where parents should be monitoring their children’s activity online. Schools cannot take on the role of parent for every student, but they do have the responsibility to protect all of those who attend their school each day. When connecting social networking postings to free speech, things get fuzzier. I believe wholeheartedly that free speech is a protected right that students should have the right to exercise. However, shouting “FIRE!” in a crowded room is intolerable, so doing the same thing online is just as unacceptable. The fact that this is an issue shows that some students (not all) are being irresponsible with the freedom social networking sites provide. Schools are accountable for hundreds of students for several hours out of the day, and if this online abuse continues, they need to have the right to monitor online activity. Students are putting it out there and should be mindful of who is watching.
Like Annika mentioned, I think it is important for parents to be the primary monitor of their children's social networking activities. However, it is unrealistic to assume that even the parents who monitor their children's posts the most can still keep track of everything they do. Like Annika also mentioned, schools cannot take on parents' roles of monitoring social media. However, I do not think that is the schools responsibility to monitor their students unless a post may cause harm to students, faculty, etc. In reality, I think it is the individual's responsibility to monitor his or her own usage.
I agree, not all students are responsible enough to hold the freedom of speech in social networking sites. But, it definitely is not the school's role to monitor the students. I believe it is the parents' choice to monitor their children or not. Because the line between freedom of speech and safety is such a gray area, in the case for teenagers, I believe it is the parent's responsibility to draw that line. The school has no business in monitoring the students' personal lives, and if anything harmful does happen, it is on their parents. The most the school can do is to advocate parents to keep a close watch on their student's online activity.
However, considering the recent talk about the line between national security and personal liberties, I believe the government will lean towards greater surveillance. Instead of the parents watching over their child's activity on social networking sites, this responsibility may be passed onto the government, or local institutions like schools.
Personally, I firmly believe that our right to free speech should be granted, so long as what we are saying is not harmful to ourselves or to others. For a student to brag about having guns, and stating a date in which he planned to kill students is absolutely unacceptable. It reminds me of when Aragon had a bit of a scare last semester. Only half of the students attended school that day, which caused all the classes to not be able to progress in the speed that was needed. I feel that the school should intervene as ours did, but parents are more likely to stop this from happening if they take the first step. While no teenager wants their mom or dad on their social networking sites, sometimes it is a good thing to have a check-up or two to ensure that nothing potentially dangerous is occurring.
I agree with Annika, schools should have the right to monitor online activity if it gets out of hand. And it seems like there's more and more incidents like the one Sam posted about in the news that seems to call for schools to take more action. But there's way more to it than just that.
I understand that parents are the ones that we maybe instinctively or initially turn to when determining who should be responsible for monitoring children's activities online. But I don't think it's realistic to expect all parents to do the same thing. I would argue that some parents simply do not have the time, do not want to take the time out to check their children's Facebook accounts, lack the level of web knowledge, or some other explanation for not monitoring their child's online activity. Whether it's out of neglect, out of fatigue from a long day of work, lack of knowledge about the existence or severity of cyberbullying, or another reason, it happens. And besides, where would they be looking? To what extent? Would they be scrolling through their wall, or their newsfeed, or their inbox? Because cyberbullying can occur in any number of places and in a variety of ways on a social media website like Facebook alone. And what about those seemingly innocent posts that are veiled with sarcasm? This was a controversy about our very own Aragon Compliments page, although I personally think that the moderator has done a good job keeping it clean.
This was something that I read in the news about last year, but I think it's worthy of bringing up: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/24/truth4time-secret-religious-right-facebook-group-_n_1449027.html. A "secret religious right Facebook group" called Truth4Time was plotting to attack the gay community. It made me wonder: what about these "secret" Facebook groups that organize bullying tactics? It's possible that these are less prevalent that we fear them to be, but then again, we'd never know.
Perhaps it's the need for more open communication with parents and schools that we should be focusing on. Teenagers these days, I feel, are more distant than ever from parents. Many teens will suffer from bullying and never mention it to their parents, for one reason or another. Teens must be reminded that it gets better, and to feel supported by peers, parents, siblings, and teachers. But more importantly, teens must recognize the consequences of their actions. I know anti-bullying efforts have already been implemented in the years I've been in the school system, and I hope that they not only continue these efforts, but also improve upon them by hearing feedback from student victims of cyberbullying as well as student perpetrators of cybercrime. Laws can only do so much; it's changing the attitudes and perspectives of Americans that will really make an impact.
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