Don't Fence Me In

"Fences are made for those who cannot fly." -Elbert Hubbard

The Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) is a federal law mandating "technology protection measures" be enacted by schools and libraries which receive certain categories of government funding.

While few would argue against filtering access to sites that are obscene or display child pornography, determining what is "harmful to minors (for computers that are accessed by minors)" is a bit more challenging.

Teachers and students frequently find themselves unable to access information because their school districts and public libraries block legitimate websites containing red flag words like "sex" or "weapons," regardless of the context in which these terms appear.

In June 2003, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the Online Policy Group (OPG) released Internet Blocking in Public Schools: A Study on Internet Access in Educational Institutions. According to a press release, "The study found that blocking software overblocked state-mandated curriculum topics extensively -- for every web page correctly blocked as advertised, one or more was blocked incorrectly. "

On Wednesday, January 13, 2010 ISTE-SIGMS is hosting a webinar, "Fight the Filter," at 8 pm E.S.T. Presenter Buffy Hamilton will help participants "explore the reasons for the current state of restrictive filtering policies and discuss concrete strategies for effectively challenging and changing filtering policies."

Librarians, classroom teachers, and other interested educators should plan to attend this timely and important discussion.

Our children need clear, consistent safety policies and guided practice in good digital citizenship...not walls or fences.



“Surely there is grandeur in knowing that in the realm of thought, at least, you are without a chain; that you have the right to explore all heights and depth; that there are no walls nor fences, nor prohibited places, nor sacred corners in all the vast expanse of thought..." -Robert Green Ingersoll






"Don't Fence Me In" by ryancboren

The Loftiest of Cowardice

"Fear of corrupting the mind of the younger generation is the loftiest of cowardice." -Holbrook Jackson

A recurring motif in literature is the desire to gain forbidden knowledge, which always results in a punishment of some sort: acquisition of understanding intertwined with loss of innocence .

Re. Pandora:

"But the woman took off the great lid of the jar with her hands and scattered, all these and her thought caused sorrow and mischief to men. Only Hope remained there in an unbreakable home within under the rim of the great jar, and did not fly out at the door..." Hesiod, Works and Days

Re. Eve:

"... but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, 'Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it,lest ye die.' And the serpent said unto the woman, 'Ye shall not surely die; for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.' And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof and ate, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he ate. And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves things to gird about." Genesis 3:3-7, 21st Century King James Version

Banning & censoring books, filtering the Internet may appear to protect our children, but at what cost?


Filtering & censorship:
A Question of Censorship (October 3, 2007)
Only Those Places (January 18, 2008)
Unsuited to Age Group (February 17, 2008)

Al Upton & Jabiz Raisdana:
A Heavy Armor (March 14, 2008)
Listen (March 20, 2008)
A Confederacy of Dunces (March 27, 2008)
Spindles (April 5, 2008)


"You can cage the singer but not the song." -Harry Belafonte



"Pandora" by John William Waterhouse, Wikimedia Commons

Unsuitable

Our two copies of the local paper weren't in my mailbox Monday morning, and the high school secretary wasn't sure why.

A message from another librarian explained the situation:

Okay, I know someone will bring this up.

The Newspspaper is not delivering to schools today because the publisher believes a story on the front page is "inappropriate for schools"?!

I think a response is called for.

The responses from the LMS in our BOCES were variations on this reply:

I believe we should all email The Publisher and let him know that since we pay for the newspaper it is our right and responsibility to do the censoring.

I wrote:

Mr. P,

Please deliver our copies of the Post Star. I will advise our administrators and staff about the questionable photo and let them decide who should have access.

The Publisher's first reply:

"...I didn’t decide that the article wasn’t appropriate for school use – I decided that a photo could be objectionable to some parents. Our plan was to call the schools and ask if you would like them delivered after you had a chance to see the photo. If we had just sent them out and they were passed around without proper notice we would have been accused of being insensitive. Please remember that papers are delivered to elementary schools as well..."

Please note none of the librarians or schools ever received a phone call.

Second, more extended, response from the Publisher:

This will serve as my answer to the many questions on why The Newspaper wasn’t immediately delivered to your school today.

In working on the series about one of our servicemen that died, after injuries sustained while serving his country, we were given a photo of the young man badly burned. We questioned the reaction of readers but decided that it was relevant to the story and the family had supplied the photo, giving permission to print it. Since we didn’t have a lot of time between the decision to print the photo and the delivery of your papers we felt that we should “hold back” the papers to be sure you knew what was printed, giving you the appropriate time to make the decision about distribution in your schools. We should give you 24 hours notice to decide on how you want to handle these matters in your individual classrooms or libraries – we were not able to do this and this is why the decision was made.

There was never any effort to censor or thought that you couldn’t make the proper decision. We understand that you are well-educated adults but we would have been seen as negligent if we just sent them out. I have no doubt that you would have made the right call for your students – if we had given you the proper notice. I wasn’t making the decision for you; I was giving you some time to deal with it on your own. I understand how busy you must be in the morning and I didn’t want this to get missed in the rush.

Some of you have suggested that we should have attached a flyer to the bundle to explain. Flyers fall off of bundles every day and I didn’t want to take the chance that this could happen with such an important message.

I appreciate those of you with professional messages, asking for your papers. Your understanding is appreciated.

Perhaps you’re not used to seeing media trying to show sensitivity to an issue but that’s all I was trying to do. If you believe there was another motive, I’m sorry. We like to put out more newspapers each day, not less.

I apologize for the disruption to your day.

When I read the paper at home that morning, before leaving for school, I was saddened by the photo, did not linger on the disturbing image, did not even notice that the young man was naked except for a towel across his lap. The picture was located on page 4 of the first section; other, less sensational, photos of the soldier were printed on the front page.

I had copied my correspondence with the publisher to our principals and superintendent. Once the newspapers were finally delivered to the school, I showed these administrators the picture in question. We all agreed to make the issue available in the library. There were no comments from the staff members and high school students who read it.

How would this episode have been handled in your district, your BOCES? Did the publisher overstep his authority? Did the librarians overreact?

Who should judge what is appropriate for educational use?




"Blindfold game 1" by Lee Carson

Lolita in the Library, Vampires on the Shelves, and Gay Penguins in the Zoo

"Oh, my Lolita, I have only words to play with!" -Humbert Humbert, Lolita (by Vladimir Nabokov)

In a chance Twitter conversation with Clay Burell today, he happened to remark that his blog was still getting traffic based on a discussion of Lolita, originally posted April 10, 2008. When I joked about pumping up my stats by finally reading and discussing the book, he mentioned a "Teachers as Blogging Vampires" post that also draws people doing a keyword search of "vampires."

Obviously, if I included both words, I might attract (trick?) more people to Journeys.

Now that you're here :-) I feel obligated to provide value. I refer you to two prior postings:

• A Question of Censorship wherein librarians are shown to be defenders of free speech
  

• Unsuited to Age to Age Group a discussion of And Tango Makes Three, the most challenged book of 2006 because of a storyline centered on a homosexual penguin couple
  

Thanks for the inspiration, Clay!


"The fact is that censorship always defeats its own purpose, for it creates, in the end, the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion." -Henry Steele Commager



"lolita" by brainware3000

Unsuited to Age Group

parent: a father or a mother; one who sires or gives birth to and/or nurtures and raises an offspring -Wikipedia

Each year the American Library Association compiles a list of the most frequently challenged books. A challenge is defined as a "formal, written complaint, filed with a library or school requesting that materials be removed because of content or appropriateness." And Tango Makes Three tops ALA's 2006 list for "homosexuality, anti-family, and unsuited to age group." The award-winning picture book, by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, is based on the true story of two male penguins parenting an egg in the Central Park Zoo, New York City.

Loudoun County, VA recently joined the list of school districts that have pulled this book off library shelves, although copies are still available in the professional collection at 16 elementary buildings. In other states, the book has been moved from the Easy section to non-fiction or may only be checked out with parental permission.

A few of our teachers are doing research units on penguins. I've shown them "And Tango Makes Three" and explained why it is considered controversial in some districts. The book is shelved in our Easy Fiction section and will remain there unless and until it is formally challenged. No titles have been removed during my years as SLMS and I don't anticipate any great outcry over Tango.

We have many variations on the concept of family in our school, and I don't think the children will be shocked by the story of two loving penguins sharing parenthood. Envious, maybe, but not shocked.

"It is not flesh and blood but the heart which makes us fathers and sons." -Johann Schiller

"IMG_2610" by cyfer13

Only Those Places

"Access only those places on the Internet which are intended to be used for appropriate information retrieval, correspondence, and communication. Appropriate is defined as morally correct, free of antisocial behaviors, pornography, and any form of abusive or obscene behavior." -Secondary Student Agreement

More than 20 students, grades 7 through 12, were suspended today for violating our district's AUP (Acceptable Use Policy). The infractions covered a three-month period; miscreants lost computer and pass privileges for two weeks. Their crime was to use a website that allowed them to circumvent the school's internet filter. Most of them had been paying illicit visits to MySpace or Facebook.

School districts across the country remain convinced that blocking inappropriate websites is the best way to keep our children safe from harm and focused on learning. Yet students continue to maneuver around school filters.

When I did some research on the issue of internet filtering and the CIPA legislation, many of the sites I found were authored by hackers offering advice on how to beat the system. Obviously, many of our middle- and high-schoolers have found the same information. By going to a website based proxy like ZTunnel, individuals logged on to the Internet can make an end run around watchdog filters. Without prior cyber safety instruction, these users are vulnerable to whatever dangers might lurk in the digital world.

In the introduction to his safe digital and social networking presentation wiki, Wesley Fryer reminds us that

"Generally adults help young people learn to drive safely before giving them car keys and turning them loose on the streets of the world. Young people also need guidance and adult assistance to learn how to safely navigate the virtual environments of the 21st Century. Schools must be proactive, rather than merely defensive, in helping students acquire the skills of digital citizenship needed today and in the future. Simply banning read/write web tools on school networks is an inadequate response: Educators must strive to learn alongside students and parents how these technologies can be safely and powerfully used to communicate and collaborate."

Fryer's wiki provides a rich assortment of multimedia resources, including PowerPoint slides, podcasts, articles, and links all addressing the need for safe digital social networking (DSN).

Julie Lindsay describes "digital citizenship" as "knowing how to behave appropriately and responsibly with regard to technology use." Her grade 9 unit called Digital Citizenship in Education outlines 9 elements essential to digital citizenship and provides a project outline and scoring rubrics. Also mentioned in Julie's blog is the free CyberSmart! K-8 curriculum, which provides worksheets and guided activities addressing issues like cyber safety and digital manners (citizenship).

Describing the frustrations of his students when encountering blocked sites, Clarence Fisher states

"I am still vastly against even the idea of filtering. Filtering content is a messy, inexact, and inappropriate solution to their being "bad things" online. I find it offensive and pure and simple censorship; something democracies should abhor. But as I think about our situation more, I am also worried. The Internet service that our school is provided with comes via a Manitoba government service called MERLIN. They provide highspeed service to many hospitals, libraries and schools. So in the end, it is my democratically elected government that is restricting the access of my students to information and content."

How should the education community define "appropriate information retrieval, correspondence, and communication" in the 21st century?



"The same fence that shuts others out shuts you in." -William Taylor Copeland

"The only fence against the world is a thorough knowledge of it." -John Locke


"None Shall Pass" by Clearly Ambiguous

...and then where should we be?

"Do not imagine, comrades, that leadership is a pleasure. On the contrary, it is a deep and heavy responsibility. No one believes more firmly than Comrade Napoleon that all animals are equal. He would be only too happy to let you make your decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions, comrades, and then where should we be?" –George Orwell, Animal Farm

Item #1
Pulitzer Award-winning columnist Leonard Pitts Jr. recently voiced his outrage over FEMA's "information management". Seems that the Agency called a news conference on very short notice, then planted FEMA staffers in the audience to act as "reporters" and ask mildly phrased questions about government response to the California wildfires.

Pitts cites this as just another example of the Bush
administration "manipulating news and information."

Item #2
The Child Internet Safety Act (CIPA) requires that:

• Schools and libraries subject to CIPA may not receive the discounts offered by the E-Rate program unless they certify that they have an Internet safety policy and technology protection measures in place. An Internet safety policy must include technology protection measures to block or filter Internet access to pictures that: (a) are obscene, (b) are child pornography, or (c) are harmful to minors, for computers that are accessed by minors.

• Schools subject to CIPA are required to adopt and enforce a policy to monitor online activities of minors; and

• Schools and libraries subject to CIPA are required to adopt and implement a policy addressing: (a) access by minors to inappropriate matter on the Internet; (b) the safety and security of minors when using electronic mail, chat rooms, and other forms of direct electronic communications; (c) unauthorized access, including so-called “hacking,” and other unlawful activities by minors online; (d) unauthorized disclosure, use, and dissemination of personal information regarding minors; and (e) restricting minors’ access to materials harmful to them.

In everyday language, this means that schools must filter internet access for all users. If valuable learning resources are blocked (try researching AIDS or even Civil War battles), and no administrator is willing or able to unblock them, at least we can all feel comfortable knowing that our children are "safe". On school computers. When closely supervised. Usually.


Item #3
USA Today reports that the Nashville school system "plans to become the first in the nation to use security cameras that spot intruders with controversial face-recognition technology." Digital photos of all students and staff members will be stored in a database. When the camera spots a face that doesn't match a stored photo, it will automatically alert security team members.

The ACLU denounced the technology as intruding on personal freedom of movement. Some police departments that tried the system have discarded it as unreliable.

No mention was made of how the procedure will prevent Columbine-like situations involving legally registered students with no prior record of violence or misbehavior.


"Big Brother is watching you.” -George Orwell, 1984


"Big Brother is watching you" by Maurosk1

A Question of Censorship

"The fact is that censorship always defeats its own purpose, for it creates, in the end, the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion." -Henry Steele Commager

I find it both ironic and disturbing that even as the ALA conducts its yearly Banned Books Week promotion (September 29–October 6, 2007), there has been an increase in educational blogging about incidences of filtering and censorship in school districts.

Despite being caricatured as "one-dimensional bookish-types", librarians are frequently on the front lines defending First Amendment rights and intellectual freedom. The American Library Association's "Freedom to Read" statement warns that "Most attempts at suppression rest on a denial of the fundamental premise of democracy: that the ordinary individual, by exercising critical judgment, will select the good and reject the bad."

Today, Tim Stahmer, in one of a series of posts on censorship, reminds us that "Schools are supposed to be institutions of learning where students gain the knowledge and skills needed to successfully live and work in the real world. And then we spend large amounts of time, effort, and money trying to block that real world from leaking through the electronic walls."

In other words, if teachers and librarians are not given the tools to provide instruction in the safe and ethical use of technology, how will our students evolve into effective collaborators, communicators, researchers, and critical thinkers?

Karl Fisch describes "two levels of override" which allow for some discretionary unblocking by his district's staff members. The trade off is that although teachers can gain access to "forbidden" sites like YouTube, students are no longer be able to "watch videos on their own, or find videos, or work on presentations that include videos, or upload their own videos."

Clay Burell takes filtering to its logical conclusion: if search engines permit students to click into pornography and other inappropriate data, then all search engines should be blocked.

Or, perhaps, all technology should be banned, blocked, filtered, suppressed, eradicated, wiped from human consciousness.

"We can never be sure that the opinion we are endeavoring to stifle is a false opinion; and if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still." -John Stuart Mill

"Fear of corrupting the mind of the younger generation is the loftiest of cowardice."
-Holbrook Jackson

"Censorship of anything, at any time, in any place, on whatever pretense, has always been and always be the last resort of the boob and the bigot." -Eugene Gladstone O'Neill



Illustration by Isaac Mao