Ethics in education

As educators, one would think that ethics will be the foundation of all actions that we take. However, with changes in the social structures, the values have evolved and the generation being taught views questions of morals with a different lens than the teachers. We used to hide behind our parents, if we met our teacher in a social situation, in our younger days - too self-conscious to behave normally as long as the teacher was around. This generation of students, on the other hand, sends teachers friend requests on Facebook, follows their Instagram, Twitter etc accounts and even expects them to Snapchat.

This does throw up some very new and peculiar questions of proprietary and ethical nature.

  • How "friendly" can you be with your students, and more importantly, how friendly can you allow them to be with you? 
  • Where is the boundary and what can be potentially considered inappropriate professional conduct?
  • What do you do as a teacher, if you notice some undesirable activity on the students' social media, without breaching their privacy?
  • Not to forget, what do you do about your own privacy when you have students following your social media accounts?

The Council has some very good resources and guidelines for teachers, which provide scenarios and stories. In my experience, if you treat social media as a public platform, which it is, then there are fewer chances of a faux pas like an embarrassing photo upload on FB or Instagram, or an insulting "tweet" accidentally going out to the wide world. A few years ago, I shared a Ted talk given by Juan Enriquez with my then cohort and often I have shown it to other classes, which is about Digital Tattoo. He talks about distractions, permanent trails of your life, lack of privacy and selfie-obsession.


I have also previously coined my own theory, which I call COP theory. I use this to respond to any invitations of my students in India to join them in a non-school related informal event, where I am likely to be the only adult around with a group of students. The theory, in brief, is as follows - 
C - Controller
O - Observer 
P - Participant
I write these three options on the board and ask the students when I join the informal group for whatever social event they are discussing these are my possible roles. Then I tell them, if I act as a controller, they would not like it and find me as a spoilsport, destroying their event. If I sit there as an observer, I would not like some of the things that I may have to see as they could clash with my values and culture. Finally, if I let myself slip into the role of a participant, and "freak out", the society and school administration would frown on it, as the teacher has to be a role model, no matter where they interact with students.

My theory was formed in the last decade of the 20th century when young adults invited me to dance parties and picnics, but it holds true today with social media and online interactions. I actively leave chat groups on Facebook, when students add me. I don't accept their friend request on my private FB account, till they are in the same school as me. They can follow me on Twitter, Instagram, but I don't follow them back. Snapchat is only for my family and friends, so even if they find me, I ignore the requests. 

My stand was corroborated recently, when I read about the news of a teacher losing his registration on texting a young student and meeting her out of school hours, without the knowledge of her parents or caregivers.


Figure from www.teachersandsocialmedia.co.nz.
-->
Teachers stories - Education council NZ
Video - Ted.com
News - New Zealand Hereald 

Comments

  1. Dan OMarch 18, 2018 at 12:38 AM

    Hi Manish,

    I subscribe to your COP theory and also reject any student friend requests I get through social media. I actually tell my year 6 students not to contact me once the year has ended as I won't be able to respond. It's hard because I get quite attached to students over the course of a year and then never see them again, but that's just part of the job. I also do the same with parents of students on social media. I think the safest course of action is to keep my professional life separate from my personal life where possible.

    All the best,
    Dan

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The end is the beginning

Image
After almost ten months in the PG program of Mindlab, here I am penning (rather typing) my thoughts on the last required activity. The learning of these 30+ weeks have not had as large an impact as Dr. Bruce turning into the Hulk, but it definitely has refined, re-calibrated and changed some of my thoughts and classroom practices. I am using the reflective model suggested in  (Rolfe & Jasper, 2001) . What :   I can safely say that I have started looking in the mirror a lot more after joining the course, of course not literally, but in context of my Professional learning. Reflective questions have made me think about what is working in my classrooms and what is not. It increased my listening and understanding the student's voice. I sought and used the comments of my colleagues on my classroom practices. The reflections have shown the need for some changes in my processes and perceptions meeting the need of the students who are not able to achieve NCEA credits in ...
Read more

On my return to education

  What? You are teaching! Again?   Should I say, Congratulations or commiserations?   Is something wrong with you? Aren’t you making more money now?  You cannot take teaching out of a teacher, can you?  These and similar reactions greeted me when I announced to my friends and family about my decision to give up my comfortable executive position and return to classroom teaching. It made me think of the decades that I have spent in the teaching profession, the things that have changed and things that haven’t. Changes have been many – some extremely revolutionary and others a bit subtle. We moved from a blackboard and chalk classroom to Whiteboard and marker, then to Smartboard and now to online Zoom lessons. Teachers started getting called tutors, facilitators and guides and are often on a first-name basis with learners (nee-students). Governments introduced and scrapped new curricula with every change in the shade of the ruling cliques. Private schools,...
Read more

Reverse assimilation is not a solution to mainstreaming

Image
Kia orā, Haere māi, welcome to Aotearoa – New Zealand - The land of long “ white ” cloud. One may think that the country has embraced bi-culturalism or even multi-culturalism whole-heartedly and is an ideal oasis in this world that groans under racist rants and vindictive violence. However, the need for talking about cultural responsiveness and the achievement gaps brings one back to reality. The almost hour-long talk of Anne Milne at CORE event and her earlier report takes aim at the inherently “racist” system that apparently is the cause of the continuous underachievement of Māori and other underprivileged sections of New Zealand society  (Milne, 2009) . Her focus as a school principal was the demographics of the community she was working in, which is predominantly Māori and Pacific. They come with a huge cultural capital of indigenous knowledge. Indigenous knowledge for me is an indistinguishable mass of practices, beliefs, folklore, religion, system of medicine, languag...
Read more