{"id":52,"date":"2009-10-13T09:49:36","date_gmt":"2009-10-13T13:49:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/internetsafety.trendmicro.com\/?p=52"},"modified":"2009-10-13T09:49:36","modified_gmt":"2009-10-13T13:49:36","slug":"internet-safety-at-home-at-school-%e2%80%93-part-2-of-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/blog\/internet-safety-at-home-at-school-%e2%80%93-part-2-of-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Internet Safety at home, at school \u2013 Part 2 of 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Blog2\"by Lynette T. Owens<\/strong><\/p>\n

This past July, on my way to meet with the IT Director of a local school district, I walked the halls of the high-school where his office was located.\u00a0 The building, like so many public schools, appeared structurally fatigued, bearing the signs and scars of decades of students passing through.\u00a0 Anyone who viewed it from the street would have been bothered by its condition and the fact that kids spent 7-8 hours a day in it, 10 months out of the year.<\/p>\n

I had expected to react similarly when the IT Director and I sat down to discuss the school\u2019s technology infrastructure.\u00a0 I assumed that whatever was in place would be a mixed bag of old and new systems and software of various brands, purchased in waves, whenever enough money could be freed up.\u00a0 I also assumed some kind of security software would be in place, but that it would be minimal.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What prompted me to schedule the meeting was an article in the Washington Post<\/a><\/span> this past June, asserting that security technology \u2013 primarily those that prevent kids from accessing inappropriate sites \u2013 have failed in our schools.\u00a0 The writer argued that such filtering technology was ineffective as kids had figured out ways to bypass it in school, while teachers were prevented from accessing sites needed for teaching purposes in the classroom.\u00a0 I decided to find out how big of a problem this really was.<\/p>\n

My assumptions going into the meeting were only partially right.\u00a0 The director had taken on the job 4 years ago and had made a number of changes \u2013 both in equipment and in policies for its use.\u00a0 Media labs were being put together for one of the elementary schools in the district, hundreds of teachers were armed with new laptops, wiring and cabling was cleaned up in the high-school, and air conditioning was added to the room where all the back-end infrastructure was housed.<\/p>\n

We then discussed the issue of kids accessing inappropriate things online in the schools.\u00a0 He did not seem overly concerned and did not indicate there were any rampant problems.\u00a0 This was good to hear.<\/p>\n

He did feel, however, they needed to ramp up education for teachers and kids about internet use and safety and security issues.\u00a0 He believed technology alone would not solve all problems he might face with regard to use and abuse of the Internet in schools.\u00a0 He also felt strongly that parents needed to be both educated and educating their kids about appropriate use of the Internet.<\/p>\n

If our kids access the Internet at school, then the same rules apply for their safety as they do at home.\u00a0 But you are not there to supervise them.\u00a0 If you are a concerned parent that wants to be sure your kids are safe online while they are at school, and that their information being put online is secure from anyone but you, here are 5 things you can do immediately with your children\u2019s schools:\u00a0<\/p>\n

1 \u2013 Engage the school administration<\/strong>.\u00a0 Ask your principal or superintendent what the overall safety and security polices are for keeping the kids\u2019, teachers\u2019 and school\u2019s internet access safe and secure.\u00a0 Most schools have codes of conduct for technology use.\u00a0 How are teachers and kids trained on this?\u00a0 Make sure such policies and procedures are also communicated and available for parents to refer to.<\/p>\n

2 \u2013 Understand what the disciplinary actions are when rules are broken<\/strong>.\u00a0 <\/strong>What happens if a teacher shows questionable Internet content in the classroom?\u00a0 How will your child\u2019s school records be impacted if they access inappropriate content on a school computer?\u00a0 What if your child is bullied online by a group of kids?\u00a0 How is this handled?<\/strong><\/p>\n

3 \u2013 Know how your child\u2019s personal information is kept secure<\/strong>.\u00a0 <\/strong>Many schools are now hosting and posting a lot of personal information about your child online \u2013 and making that accessible to you over the Internet.\u00a0 This creates lots of efficiencies for everyone, but a strong privacy and security policy and infrastructure should be in place to support it.\u00a0 Unlike previous generations, children today have so much personal information stored in digital form that parents need to be aware of where it is and how it\u2019s protected.\u00a0<\/p>\n

4 \u2013 Discuss it with other parents. <\/strong>Bring the topic up at a future PTO\/PTA meeting.\u00a0 Make sure other parents are educated and engaged in this discussion as well.<\/p>\n

5 \u2013<\/strong> Ask to be briefed regularly<\/strong>.\u00a0 Technologies change, new applications and uses for it evolve all the time.\u00a0 And where they can improve the education process, they should be used.\u00a0 How is the school assessing new technologies in the name of safety and security for your kids?\u00a0 Make this at least a yearly topic of discussion with your school administration and with parent organizations associated with the schools.<\/p>\n

The schools that I have been in contact with are very open and eager to engage with concerned parents on the topic of Internet safety. \u00a0And while they bear an enormous responsibility to ensure the safety of our kids while they are under their care, parents need to be actively aware and involved in their safety at all times. \u00a0You may have done everything possible to keep them safe and secure online while they are home, but they are not home for much of their waking hours.\u00a0 This is a topic well worth a small investment of your time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This past July, on my way to meet with the IT Director of a local school district, I walked the halls of the high-school where his office was located. The building, like so many public schools, appeared structurally fatigued, bearing the signs and scars of decades of students passing through. Anyone who viewed it from the street would have been bothered by its condition and the fact that kids spent 7-8 hours a day in it, 10 months out of the year.<\/p>\n

I had expected to react similarly when the IT Director and I sat down to discuss the school\u2019s technology infrastructure. I assumed that whatever was in place would be a mixed bag of old and new systems and software of various brands, purchased in waves, whenever enough money could be freed up. I also assumed some kind of security software would be in place, but that it would be minimal…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-for-parents","wpautop"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trendmicro.com\/internet-safety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}