Usage Of Technology Resources Policy

Imagine having to turn off all electronics and not being able to use it for a week. Technologies, such as the Internet, have provoked questions about the effects it has to students overtime. Although Internet users have become dependent to the internet, schools should not participate in national “Shut Down Your Screen Week” because the Internet is an exceptional source of information, the Internet is used for instant communication, and Internet users have shown increased signs of social interactions.

I review the Blue Valley School District Acceptable use policy for student’s K-12. Technology use is important for all students, teacher, parents and school districts in order to provide a safe digital learning environment. Technology gives way to valuable educational experience that all students are entitled to. School districts have the responsibility to provide acceptable use policies for the digital devices, and the Internet provided to students, which is owned by the district. Whenever technologies are brought upon school grounds, or to school activities, even when the technologies are not owned by the school the technologies are still subject to adhere to the acceptable use policies. The intended use of technology in education is to open new learning experiences, benefit the student’s education experience, and create skills for future academic endeavors.

At High School One (a pseudonym) a rural 2A high school in Central Washington State. There are just over 1,000 students between 9th and 12th grade, with nearly 80% of the students identifying as white and just under 20% identifying as Hispanic. All students at High School One will be equipped with their own, school provided, Chromebook as part of the one-to-one implementation beginning with the 2016-17 school year. As this involves more than 1,000 students being connected to the internet for daily assignments, tests and score reporting, the ethical and legal issues of privacy are something teachers at High School One need to be aware of. In the 2016-17 school year, I will be teaching 152 students split between three sections of 10th grade World History and 11th grade U.S. History.

Associate Superintendent Mary Jo Conery presented the proposed revisions to the district’s current policy, regulation and exhibit on technology resources. Dr. Conery provided information on the proposed additions, deletions, and/or revisions to update the language and provide elaboration on the acceptable use of movies and video content. Revisions to the policy include minor changes in wording and recognition of copyright laws and licensing agreements. Dr. Conery provided information on the Federal Copyright Act, which governs how copyrighted materials, may be used. Recommended revisions to regulation IJND-R limits the ratings of movies and video content that can be shown for instructional proposes. Exhibit IJND-E was presented with minor changes

The digital world can be found everywhere in today’s society including the classroom. There are multiple companies with products to assist educators in engaging and/or assessing their students’ progress. The Seventeenth Annual Report on Schoolhouse Commercializing Trends 2013-2014 allows the author Alex Molnar and Faith Bominger to bring attention to students’ privacy and lack of regulation by current laws.

Internet security and safety is important more so today than ever before. With the use of new technology in the classroom it is important for

While elementary and middle schools have obvious needs for restrictions, Internet access at the high school level isn't as black and white. High school students are sensitive to their given rights, yet are officially minors under the law; teenagers are ever nearing adulthood, but are sometimes viewed as immature. So, high school administrators are challenged with designing an Internet policy that meets the educational needs of the students and the moral demands of society. Although software is being designed to "censor" the content of the Internet, student trust and responsibility might be a more reasonable route.

THIS WEBSITE IS INACCESSIBLE. If you are a student with a technological device, you have probably received this message. Those in favor of strong filters insist they protect students and keep them focused. However, restrictive filters keep students from educational information, personal interests, and using personal time to the best of their abilities. To allow students to use technology to their advantage, school filters must be reduced.

Censorship is not limited to repressive regimes or network television. Weather we know it or not censorship is happening all the time throughout the day. We censor ourselves, we listen to censored music and as students we see the internet being heavily censored in school. The Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) was signed into law in 2000; the law requires any public schools or library to filter any inappropriate content from the computers being used by minors. Since the law has been put in place, schools across America have installed programs that use keywords to designate certain types of websites off-limits to students while using the schools internet server. The problem with these filtering programs is that they block many sites that are not pornographic or obscene in nature, Instead they tend to block sites dealing with controversial but not inappropriate content. Although the CIPA was created to protect, it has been used as a soft form of censorship in schools.

Accessing, transmitting, copying, creating, posting or uploading material that: violates the school's standards for student behavior (such as messages and content that are dishonest, plagiarism, pornographic, obscene, threatening, discriminatory, harassing, intimidating, or bullying) or that is illegal (such as obscenity, stolen materials, impersonating another person for harmful purposes, or violating copyrights). The District will notify and fully cooperate with law enforcement if it becomes aware of any illegal use of the District Network.

Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA). (n.d.). Retrieved January 17, 2012, from American Library Association: http://www.ala.org/ala.aboutala/offices/oif/iftoolkit/ALA

In this day and age, technology takes center stage. Temple College students understand this well, considering nearly all school assignments require access to a computer and the internet. This need for technology prompts a vast majority of students to take advantage of the computers provided by the school. However, these students are forced to maneuver around blocked websites and other internet restrictions put in place by T.C. Temple College students should have access to all websites when they are using T.C. computers on the grounds that students are mature, they are paying for access, and restricted access to the internet limits students resources.

The Internet plays a key role in the development of education. According to past research findings, 72% of adolescents surveyed reported using the Internet for school objectives and nearly all of them go online daily (Norris, 2007). Additionally, many interviewed teenagers and parents reported that Internet use is vital to complete school projects. Adolescents need to be educated on how to maximize the legitimacy and safety of online information. Adolescents awareness of the potential impact from internet use and exposure is a

Congress made an attempt to place content-based restrictions on school and public library internet use in the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) of 2000. This act requires the use of some type of internet filtering software for all public libraries that attain funds from the Federal government (in the form of E-rate discounts or Library Services and Technology Act grants). Should a library refuse to comply with CIPA guidelines, that library would have to maintain its technological services without the government discount or LSTA grants. Holding to the CIPA guidelines, both the E-rate and LSTA stipulate that filters may be disabled or ‘legitimate’ sites unblocked by adults who request it, but it is unclear “whether libraries ‘must’ provide for such disabling” (Anten 79).

Teachers need to incorporate the use of firewalls, filtering software and AUP’s into the classroom to practice ethical use of technology in the classroom. Firewalls will protect the classroom and home computers from unwanted viruses. The firewall detects when a virus is being introduced to the network and will take measures to keep the virus from infecting a computer. Filtering software is important because it will not allow students to view unwanted material or websites (Shelly, G, Gunter, G, and Gunter, R 2012). Teachers