Social Media Policies

Week 6

This week we were asked to modify our school district's Social Media Policy or create one. 

The public school district that I work for does not have a Social Media Policy or even an Acceptable Use Policy for technology. Middle and High School teachers send an Acceptable Use Agreement form home with students to allow them to bring their own technology. This form must be returned to school signed by themselves and their parents. The Acceptable Use Agreement outlines what technology is and how it should be used at school for educational purposes. It also has students agree that they will only use the wifi provided by the school. (St. Charles Parish Public Schools, 2015) This helps to ensure that students will not used sites and apps that are blocked by the internet filter while on the premises.

As far as employees are concerned, in my district, there are no policies stating what can and cannot be accessed in regards to social media.

This document is my idea of what could be used within my school district as a Social Media Use Policy. It is going to be focused on student usage of social media in the classroom.

Student Social Media Policy

Our impact

1. Follow the school's code of conduct when writing online.  It is acceptable to disagree with someone else's opinions, however, do it in a respectful way.  Make sure that criticism is constructive and not hurtful.  What is inappropriate in the classroom is inappropriate online. (Cornwall-Lebanon School District, 2016)
2. Do your own work!  Do not use other people's intellectual property without their permission.  It is a violation of copyright law to copy and paste other's thoughts. When paraphrasing another's idea(s) be sure to cite your source with the URL.  It is good practice to hyperlink to your sources. (Cornwall-Lebanon School District, 2016)
3. Users are responsible for their own behavior when communicating with social media. They will be held accountable for the content of the communications that they state/post on social media locations. (Pottsville Area School District, 2011)
4. Remember your audience: Be aware that a presence in the social media world is or easily can be made available to the public at large. This includes prospective students, current students, current employers and colleagues, and peers. Consider this before publishing to ensure the post will not alienate, harm, or provoke any of these groups.  (Ball State University, 2009)
5. Strive for accuracy: Get the facts straight before posting them on social media. Review content for grammatical and spelling errors. This is especially important if posting on behalf of the university in any capacity. (Ball State University, 2009)

Access

6. Users should have no expectation of privacy in anything they create, store, send, receive, or display on or over the School District’s CIS systems, and the School DIstrict’s authorized third partiers’ systems, including their personal files or any of their use of these systems. (Pottsville Area School District, 2011)
7. Track your success. Analyze and organize your content to improve your social media account. Use analytic tools to assess your progress and keep track of posts that users respond to positively. (Kansas State University, 2015)
8. Families can be helpful partners. Share your digital footprint with your parents and consider their suggestions. Get your parents’ input about what information they feel should remain private and what is fine to post publicly.  (New York Department of Education, 2013)
9. Adjust your privacy settings appropriately. Privacy settings are automatically set by social media providers governing who can see your posts, how information is linked, and what data is available to the public. Each social media platform has different privacy setting defaults and some change those settings without making it obvious to you. (New York Department of Education, 2013)
10. Report the behavior and get help. If you are being cyberbullied or hear about/observe someone else being cyberbullied, report the behavior and get help. You can tell a parent, school staff, another adult family member, or a trusted adult. (New York Department of Education, 2013)

Feedback

Before this document is even distributed to parents and students, the technology team that oversees the district's use of technology must agree and sign off on the wording of the document. 

Once the document is fine-tuned enough to receive feedback, it should be given to the legal department to receive their feedback. Feedback from the law offices will decide edits before release to the public.

After the law offices have given their edits, the document is ready to be released in DRAFT form to the public. At the next board meeting, the Superintendent and Board members can release the DRAFT and the following Google Forms link to collect feedback: http://goo.gl/forms/7zFbUEO03R7boHyh2.

Feedback will be collected for a month. This allows members of the community, parents, and even students to voice their opinions on the chosen policies. Edits will be made based on appropriate feedback from the community. 

References

Ball State University. (2009). Ball State University Social Media Policy. Retrieved from https://cms.bsu.edu/-/media/WWW/DepartmentalContent/Library/Copyright/PDFs/BallState_SocialMediaPolicy.pdf

Cornwall-Lebanon School District. (2016). Social Media/Network Guidelines for Students. Retrieved from http://www.clsd.k12.pa.us/staff.cfm?subpage=624705

Kansas State University. (2015). Social Media Guidelines. Retrieved from http://www.k-state.edu/socialmedia/bestpractices.html

New York City Department of Education. (2013) Student Social Media Guidelines. Retrieved from http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/9765B2DF-9BD5-42AA-8D85-005D0FC8AA23/0/Student_Social_MediaGuidelines_finalv3_20140128.pdf

Pottsville Area School District. (2011). Social Media Policy. Retrieved from http://www.pottsville.k12.pa.us/cms/lib07/PA01916599/Centricity/Domain/38/Social%20Media%20Policy%20-%20Students.pdf

St Charles Parish Public Schools. (2015). Bring your own technology - letter of agreement. Retrieved from

http://www.stcharles.k12.la.us/site/handlers/filedownload.ashx?moduleinstanceid=1287&dataid=1508&FileName=byot_letter_of_agreement.pdf