Wes Fryer tipped us off, yesterday, to a Boing Boing article about the National School Boards Association. Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing’s principal writer, says, (referring to a Tech Blorge article from August 7, Schooboards: Net Dangers Over-Rated; Bring Social Networks to School, by David Cassel):
Boing Boing: School boards: The Internet is safe and we should use it more:
National School Boards Association (a nonprofit that represents 95,000 US school-board members) did a comprehensive study of students’ experiences with the Internet, especially with social networking sites. They determined that the much-touted risk of online stalkers and predators was basically nonexistant (0.08 percent of students surveyed had ever gone to meet a stranger without parental permission). The best part is their recommendation to schools: stop fearing the Internet and embrace it as an incredible tool for instruction.
According to the Tech Blorge article‘s reporting of the NSBA report (pdf), based on an online survey of 1,277 students, 1,039 parents, and 250 school district leaders:
- 20% of students said they’d seen “inappropriate” pictures on social networking sites in the past 3 months
- 18% said they’d seen inappropriate language
- 7% said they’d been “cyberbullied,” or asked about their personal identiy on a social networking site.
- 4% said they’d had online conversations that made them uncomfortable
- 2% said an online stranger tried to meet them in person.
- Only one of the students, out of 1,277 said that they had met a person from the internet without their parents’ permission.
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| Graphic from Creating & Connecting (pda) report from the National School Boards Association. |
By contrast, the study, Creating & Connecting, reported that 59% of online students talked about education issues, and 50% said that they talked specifically about schoolwork online.
I’ve had the privilege of working with the NSBA staff on several occasions and once with the state leadership, and have come away with the very same impression that I had from the Council for Chief State School Officers institute last week. They get it. They believe it.
- Our economic environment is changing.
- Our children’s information lifestyle is dramatically different, and
- The very information landscape has almost entirely reshaped itself over technological advances of seismic proportions.
But getting it is only step one. As I implied in my TechLearning blog this week (The Question has Changed), we’ve done a pretty good job of answering the “why” question. Now we have to figure out how to sell it.
Recommendations from the report:
- Explore Social Networking Sites.
- Consider using social networking for staff communications and professional development.
- Find Ways to harness the educational value of social networking.
- Ensure equitable access.
- Pay attention to the nonconformists.
- Reexamine social networking policies.
- Encourage social networking companies to increase educational value.
Many many thanks for this new report from the NSBA!
Cory, Doctorow. “School Boards: The Internet is Safe and We Should Use it More.” [Weblog Boing Boing] 8 Aug 2007. 9 Aug 2007 <http://www.boingboing.net/2007/08/08/school_boards_the_in.html>.
David, Cassel. “Schoolboards: Net Dangers Over-Rated: Bring Social Networks to School.” [Weblog Tech Blorge] 7 Aug 2007. 9 Aug 2007 <http://tech.blorge.com/Structure:%20/2007/08/07/schoolboards-net-dangers- over-rated-bring-social-networks-to-school/>.
“Creating and Connecting // Research and Guidelines on Online Social — and Educational — Networking.” National School Board Association. 9 Aug 2007 <http://files.nsba.org/creatingandconnecting.pdf>.
This is encouraging but I can see skeptics pointing out that the NSBA report was funded by Microsoft, News Corp, and Verizon.
Don’t these companies have a large stake in schools embracing social networks and using the Internet more?
Yes, I saw that too, and had the same thoughts. It also concerned me that we are surveying students. I’ve had some experience with this, and students tend to tell us what they think we want to hear. It’s what we teach them to do.
But it seems to me that the stakes are too high to chip away at this. I’m sensing a swell of realization that I hope is going to drown out the skeptics.
Not that the skeptics need to be completely silenced. We need them. We need both sides of the argument.
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“Only one of the students, out of 1,277 said that they had met a person from the internet without their parents’ permission.”
I am not sure parents understand the dangers of letting their children meet people face to face that they met on line. Parents may be giving permission but are they with their child as they meet this stranger? This makes me nervous and I am not sure if the data is a bit skewed.
There are four primary authors of Boing Boing. Mark Frauenfelder, Cory Doctorow, David Pescovitz and Xeni Jardin.
Rick, as I said above, I too wonder about the quality of the data. Again, kids tend to say what they think we want to hear. It’s what we teach them to do. At the same time, we have taught ourselves to be afraid. I suspect, and this report seems to bare this out, that kids are a lot more careful on the Net than we fear, and that there are many more situations that our children encounter, with our knowledge, that are far more dangerous.
Tom, I stand corrected. It’s just that Cory seems to be the only one that I ever read. Odd!
Whether the data is skewed or not, it’s so nice to read a publication from NSBA that reinforces all the things that we, as educators and instructional technology people, benefit in our own professional development. How easy is it to build the professional learning communities that the National Staff Development Council tells is the cornerstone of today’s professional development using today’s social networking tools? Get teachers talking and sharing best practices…that’s what it’s all about! We all know that this is difficult with the compacting of our instructional and planning time. But the use of social networking is huge for that alone! Imagine how our students would feel if they were suddenly allowed (and that’s such an ugly term) to utilize ‘stuff’ that they use outside the brick and mortar of our schools. Whoa! We need to embrace…not fear or write if off as ‘kids stuff’ anymore. Change is a very slow process but this is one that needs to happen now!