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Sender: American Memory Fellows <AMFELLOWS@RS8.LOC.GOV>
Poster: Peter Milbury <pmilbury@CUSD.CHICO.K12.CA.US>
Subject: Re: Best practices
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Dear AMFELLOWS,
Thanks to Judy for sharing her experiences with this problem. This is
quite an important area to be aware of and prepared for. Our library,
school and district handle it in several ways.
District: The parent handbook which all parents receive once a year
includes our district policy in which we lay out our use policies. These
include a strong emphasis on student responsibility for appropriate
behavior online, and states that Internet use is integrated into our
curriculum.
School: All students at our school may apply for e-mail accounts, and also
server space for Web pages. In order to obtain these, a form outlining
appropriate behavior for these services must be signed by the parents. We
are now in the process of training all teachers to effectively use the
Internet in their classes, and part of that trainiing is what to look for
on the screens when their students are using the Web.
Library: In the 54 library computers which are connected to the Internet
and which are freely accessible to all students. We have little stickers
on each monitor which stresses key points of the AUP (no chatting, porn,
gaming, etc.) When they activate the Web browser a contract appears on the
first screen again outlining briefly our AUP. See:
http://dewey.chs.chico.k12.ca.us/agree.html
When we first began using the Internet in the high schools, (starting out
mainly in the libraries) nine or so years ago, we started developing our
policies and procedures. At my prior school library (Pleasant Valley H.S.)
across town the only problem we had was when a parent came in and tried to
"prove a point" by accessing nudes, but the principal directed him to
leave the campus for inappropriate Internet use!
In the four years that we have had this sort of access at CHS, we have
never had a parent complaint. However, when we have found studenmts
engaged in inappropriate use, and have applied discipline, some parents
have been in denial that their children could do such a thing.
Guess it cuts both ways....
I hope that this is helpful to you.
Peter Milbury pmilbury@cusd.chico.k12.ca.us
Librarian-Mentor Teacher http://www.cusd.chico.k12.ca.us/~pmilbury
American Memory Fellow: Library Of Congress - National Digital Library
Chico High School, Chico, CA 95926 http://dewey.chs.chico.k12.ca.us
A National Blue Ribbon and California Distinguished School 530-891-3036
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On Sat, 13 Mar 1999, Judy Drummond wrote:
> I would like to add my two cents here. Cathy Johnson and I started talking
> about American Memory when school began in August, but were unable to get
> hook-ups until February, but I asked students who had computers at home to
> begin learning how to access American Memory and browsing the collections.
> I also spoke about our projects at Open House and many parents were very
> excited and have browsed through the collections themselves.
>
> Well, I just had a parent conference with one family who said their son
> told them he had homework on the Web every night and spent hours "chatting"
> with friends. The conference was,of course, held because Jeremy was not
> completing his home assignments. Duh... When questioned, Jeremy confessed
> he was chatting with new friends he made on the web, and yes, a lot of the
> discussions revolved around sex and violence. The parents were very
> shocked and, of course, wanted to blame me. We had a lovely discussion
> about their role in knowing what their child was doing on the computer, and
> about how there were no such assignments written on the homework logs they
> are supposed to sign every night. It could have turned out very
> differently.
>
> San Francisco Unified recently sent a letter to all students and parents
> about the need for parents to monitor their children on the web. The
> problem was it was too wordy, too much legal lingo, and I'm sure no one
> read it. I'm trying to redo it to make it more understandable to our
> population. This is a major problem.
>
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