The attempt by the Vancouver Board of Education to stuff the social-media genie back in the lamp is certainly well-intentioned and the policy, if successfully implemented, might at least provide a platform on which disciplinary action can be considered if employees are unwise enough to misbehave on the Internet.
The problem will be deciding what actually constitutes misbehaviour.
There will be clear instances, fortunately rare, when adult-child relationships fostered on social media are clearly inappropriate. At least it will be possible to cite the policy and its consequences to the adults.
The kids are less likely to pay attention to what school trustees think is appropriate.
The exploding popularity of social-media sites has engendered a prurient interest in teachers鈥� 鈥減rivate鈥� lives by both school administrators and the media. Some newspapers across the U.S. and sa国际传媒 have begun trolling social-networking sites for embarrassing and titillating postings by local teachers. And there鈥檚 a treasure trove of material to be mined
Then there will be the kind of problem created by an Illinois teacher who recently resigned very publicly on YouTube. Her impassioned declaration blamed standardized testing for her loss of faith in her ability to pursue professional excellence.
The media picked up on her video and reported her claims as fact. The teacher鈥檚 claims became the reality.
Turns out that some aspects of the situation were missed by reports. Her discontent, as acknowledged by her own union president, was more about being involuntarily transferred because of the 鈥渢oxic atmosphere鈥� among staff at the school.
Nonetheless, the passionate public resignation discredited the school in question and public education generally, but the video, not the background narrative, became the story.
And that鈥檚 the problem with the social-media genie 鈥� there is no filter to distinguish opinion, fact and the outpouring of frustration by somebody who does not really care what the collateral damage might be.
There have been numerous examples of school district employees portraying themselves on their Facebook pages in ways that are not reassuring about the kind of people to whom the community hands over its kids daily.
True, teachers have a right to private lives, private opinions, private interests and beliefs. The social-media genie, however, is all about everything 鈥� except private.
The genie wants to tell everybody everything about 鈥渕e鈥� 鈥� personal habits, private predilections, relationships, what I like to shop for, what I had for breakfast, what a really interesting person I am 鈥� stuff people once revealed only to their closest friends or relatives, and even then at some risk to their reputations.
But now, people don鈥檛 seem to worry about what idiosyncrasies they choose to reveal about themselves to the world.
As my Irish grandfather said often enough, you can protect people from almost everything 鈥� except themselves. Policy, no matter how thoughtfully devised, will not cover that.
Teachers-to-be need to remember that the possibilities of a career in public education were not enhanced for one young San Antonio student teacher who posted pictures of herself in various stages of drunkenness with the catchy caption: 鈥淐an U say wasted?鈥� She also wrote: 鈥淒rinking and partying is my life. I鈥檓 gonna be a high school English teacher one day.鈥�
Not in sa国际传媒, in all likelihood.
And it is not even always about what people say about themselves.
Last month, the CBC reported the plight of a Vancouver teacher who says his career has been derailed by an ex-girlfriend who won鈥檛 stop posting countless defamatory and offensive comments about him on the web. He has applied for several teaching jobs since January, with no positive response, and believes prospective employers are turned off by the web postings. 鈥淭his is a dark place. It鈥檚 a very, very dark place to be 鈥� and I am powerless,鈥� he said.
The Vancouver board鈥檚 proposed policy is a good idea and other boards will follow, but the genie is out there, so people in positions of community responsibility need to be careful what they wish for. The world is watching.
Geoff Johnson is a retired superintendent of schools.
