The Perfect Storm...

[liz_marcs]

Let's see if LJ lets me post this.

I've been involved off and on with fandom since...ooooo...grammar school (that would be pre-teens for you non-U.S. people). I can't say for sure, but definitely almost that long.

And I have to say, before this week the only Perfect Storm I knew about was the one I lived through back in 1991 when the No Name nor'

Comments

[essene]

although I can't see teachers failing to enforce a no-"MySpace" rule in the classroom itself.

Oh, you can try all you like, but unless the district or school has set up some sort of nanny/firewall that won't allow sites like these to open (as mine has) they'll still try, and you know they've tried when you hear the wail of "It won't load MySpace!" even after you've told them NOT to go there. ;-)

I did mis-speak in my haste. I don't think it should be a LAW. A site by site rule, or a district policy, fine--but at some, point we are crossing into censorship (however, you only have to look at the list of banned books to know that this is something the supreme court is already comfortable with our schools doing). There are valuable and educational things to be found in blogs, many of which are hosted on such communities. Much of the problem lies in teaching how to sift the wheat from the chaff and in an era of NCLB? There is no time to spend doing that AND teaching to the test. (Am I hiding my hatred of the current educational system?)

Public libraries--you should be able to go and do what you please...within reason, and the library should be responsible for installing safeguards or montitoring in someway that it's not being used for porn/molestation/stalking and whatnot. Though I don't think a censorship/big-brother LAW is the way to go.

School libraries--I tend to be a bit more touchy on the subject as I work in education and I know the inherent difficulties of attempting to "trust" students, or even teachers to use smart surfing, or use the web for educational purposes only. Our own library is only open during school hours so our students don't have the opportunity to come before or after school to use anything--which again, is a whole 'nother issue--but there are some libraries that function as both public AND school libraries. I tend to think of these dual use libraries as needing to meet very different needs, in each realm they have a foot in.

[everenthralledx]

Oh, you can try all you like, but unless the district or school has set up some sort of nanny/firewall that won't allow sites like these to open (as mine has) they'll still try, and you know they've tried when you hear the wail of "It won't load MySpace!" even after you've told them NOT to go there. ;-)

You'll hear that wail for about two days, which is how long it will take the students to find a way to circumvent the firewalls and NetNannies.