PRIVACY LAWS
https://tse4.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.KS6puttuF_jY7u_kOIDX-gHaE8&pid=15.1&P=0&w=255&h=171
CIPA/COPPA
Are the current privacy laws enough to protect children? Hmmm? I had to give this a great deal of thought. When contemplating my response, I debated with myself over and over again. I remember when my son first joined my space, my older brother was like a stalker on my son's account and never even looked at his own children's account. I wasn't angry because at least someone was watching and monitoring other than me.
So, in reflecting on the CIPA (Children's Internet Protection)/COPPA (Children's Online Privacy and Protection Act) regulations for providing website that track children, I most definitely agree with the 13 year old child needing parent consent and not tracking them. It's amazing that children find a way around almost everything. The problem is this only benefits the honest children. Dana Boyd makes a true statement children will lie.
In my role as an elementary teacher, I find that children 13 years and under post information and pictures that older children may think twice about. I'm not saying they won't post it, they just might give it a little more thought. Thinking about some of the post a few of my students have posted are very sexual, bullying, gang related and just disrespectful. I had a student post me redirecting another student. Thank God I was professional in my redirection because it could have been very ugly for me.
As I think about the privacy laws, I wish their was a way to have the website video chat and have parents fax in a statement of a parental monitor agreement of the accounts. If parents received a copy of all post on their child's social media page, I believe that fewer stalkers, bully's, suicidal comments, and threats of violent acts against mass amounts of people would occur. Thinking of the recent act of mass violence and all the other acts of mass violence against schools probably would not happen if parents were receiving copies of post on their minor children pages. It has become an epidemic that our students and staff are no longer safe in school. That's one place they should be safe. It is scary when you need to lock yourself in the classroom with your students to keep unwanted individuals out. I'm sure somewhere those individuals are posting these threats, but for some reason they are not taken seriously.
It's not enough that CIPA/COPPA are monitoring because children lie and that's a fact. Parents monitoring post would make students think about sites they subscribe to and the post they publish. I am a firm believer in responsible social media use. As my students get older and graduate high school, I will accept their friend request as long as they have a clean page. If they have drugs, gang or guns on their page, I ignore their request. I then send them a message in their inbox requesting them to create a clean page and I will accept their friend request. They understand because I have not changed. I've never accepted their inappropriate behavior. Often times when I notice they are using profanity, I jokingly say "I know that I never taught you how to say or spell those words". Their response is usually, "I apologize Ms. McNeil-Smith". When I see them with their parents, they always say "that I still don't let them get away with anything". So it's great what they are doing now with the privacy laws, but with this generation we have today and all of the technology progress, they (CIPA/COPA) need to improve and increase their method of verifying age of subscribers to websites. It could possibly keep more children safe.
For more information, please visit the following sites: https://www.fcc.gov/, https://www.ftc.gov/, https://www.ftc.gov/policy/federal-register-notices/16-cfr-part-312-childrens-online-privacy-protection-rule-proposed-3
For more information, please visit the following sites: https://www.fcc.gov/, https://www.ftc.gov/, https://www.ftc.gov/policy/federal-register-notices/16-cfr-part-312-childrens-online-privacy-protection-rule-proposed-3
It is an interesting idea to send copies of social media postings to parents. Perhaps one way to begin to make a change is to have parents receive an email having to verify a child's social media account and to have children check off a box saying "I understand by having this social media account my parents will have access to my posts".
ReplyDeleteExactly, we allow our children to many freedoms. Mentally they are not mature enough to make those decisipn on their own. They want to be accepted by their peers, which leafs to poor judgement. Teachers and schools should not be expected to battle the epidemic alone.
DeleteI could not agree more with wanting other ways to verify our children are being safe online and I think you offer some effective solutions, that if implemented, could really help parents and teachers keep children safe online. My questions (and worry) is that online administrators are either way too inundated with work that they cannot monitor everything that is posted online, or there needs to be more of them so that we can better verify users and monitor them, and report (to the appropriate guardian or agency) those that are not.
DeleteAbsolutely! We need more individuals to verify that students have permission and monitors of their use of social mediate. This needs to expanded because technology has expanded and we need to keep our students safe.
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