I find it appalling that one's first amendment rights end when you enter the classroom. Macarthyism, red-baiting, character assasination--no wonder our best and brightest loathe the idea of becoming a teacher. Have we learned nothing from history? What is next, cameras in our homes and bedrooms to show that we are morally pure and fit to educate our young?

Is this an incredible double standard where our youth simulate 50,000 murders gaming at home and online, where whole nations of young people all over the world engage in all kinds of social networking including all kinds of activities proper society would consider dangerous and immoral.

The end result of this sanctimonious, holier than thou police state will merely make our public schools fortresses of ignorance where teaching innnvoative, progressive, and up to date technology is impossible and openly suppressed.

Welcome all the luddites and purveyors of moral correctness to our brave new world!

These kinds of realities only remind that I couldn't possibly stomach being a teacher in a new life--not with what I know now.

Sincerely,

Victor Bradley

Aloha!!!

This is my first day in this forum for a class that I am taking for professional development. This article grabbed my interest. As I linked to the article and read it, I immediately printed copies to give to two student teachers in my department. (I just handed them to them.)

All I can say is that wisdom comes with age. Regrettfully the consequences of one's actions usually come after one has behaved badly. From the sounds of it, a few too many newbies are still caught in the angst of youth. Hopefully, the behavior and lack of wisdom that they have demonstrated might be something that they would frown upon if their students did the same. However, its hard to lead where you don't go. By that I mean if you want students to act wisely, you must demonstrate it even on the internet.

The social-networking sites are dangerous for adults too.

As adults, we must demonstrate wisdom. Consider the audience that maybe out there.

This is the first time I have replied to anything so please be patient with me. As the wife of a police officer an mother of 3 (21, 18 and 14) I know that this is a very sensitive topic. We must all try to remember one thing: these very young teachers are human beings, prone to the same errors are own young adult children make. Unfortunately, because, they are teaching our children, our first inclination is to fire them, hang them out to dry, with no chance to redeem themselves or save their careers. Instead, we should be educating them on the potential dangers of their actions.

Most of them don't think that their students and the parents of these kids will be looking at their blogs just to spy on them. Our young teachers are still coming into adulthood and instead of mentoring them we throw them into the fire, now in charge of teenagers that are only a few years younger than they are. Some of them are still trying to be "friends" with the students because they don't yet know how to do anything else. I think these blogs are reflective of this.

If it is determined that a young teacher knowingly, intentionally created a site to do harm, then he/she deserves whatever they get. But I think that most are just using bad judgement (as we all do from time to time) due to immaturity.

The school system that hires these teachers should continue to mentor/monitor their progress as teachers, helping these young teachers to make wise decisions, especially when it comes to the internet. They need to be reminded how easliy they can ruin their lives over what may either be a bad joke or just bad judgement, something that can be corrected by giving them a little more time to growing up!!