July 17

How do public policies impact the use of technology?
In the district I work for, our policies are very specific in regards to technology. There are specific guidelines for acceptable uses of all technology during school time and on district-owned devices.  There are policies regarding gaming, email, social networking, chatting, account creation, etc.

How are these policies impacting students and teachers?
These policies make it very difficult for me as a teacher.  I often hear of a new website or technology that I would like to use in my class, but I am unable to use it because it is blocked by the district. We can petition for the district to change the accessibility of the website/technology, but the wait period can be several months.  It is also hard for teachers to know which sites are accessible to students because our policies are different from those of our students.  We may be able to access the site without a problem, but our students may be blocked from the same site.  My district goes so far as to block sites such as Weebly (unless you use the paid version).

I have run into other problems with district policy interfering with state curriculum.  There is a class that I would love to teach which is all about social networking, pod casting, etc. However, the sites needed to effectively teach this curriculum are nearly all blocked by the district.  We are only allowed to demonstrate the use of the sites at school. We cannot require our students to practice using them.  I feel that this takes away the fun of the class; therefore, I have decided to keep this course out of our course catalog.

Yes, I do believe some policies are necessary.  But are they really effective?  How many students bring their own smart phones and access any sites they want while on school property?  Do we really have the ability to control the content our students are viewing?  At what point do we leave that to their own discretion?