Should teachers be punished for personal posts on social-networking sites?

This is such a loaded issue.I agree that as teachers we have a right to personal lives, but we are also professionals. Many companies are letting people go, because of inappropriate internet postings. They expect their employees to carry themselves respectably. Why should this be any different for teachers? We are role models for our students. It is one thing to "enjoy" yourself after school hours, but when you post pictures or text about un-professional behaviors they can easily become permanent. Even if you delete them they could've been copied and easily manipulated.
In college, I was in a sorority and we were required to sign a proper internet posting agreement. Violation of this agreement could result in disciplinary actions or even disaffiliation from the sorority. This was a social group, but since we were expected to up hold certain values and present ourselves as up standing college students, we were expected to do this outside of sorority activities. Why should this be any different with teachers? We're getting paid to be role models and educators. How can we expect respect from our students if we're not presenting ourselves as professionals?
Personally, I enjoy using Facebook and MySpace as a connection to my students. I think it is great for them to see a young adult, who is successful that they can relate too. They can learn about me and build that connection and I can't imagine them seeing me kick back drinking a beer with friends or wearing a bikini at the lake. They are too young to understand these acceptable adult behaviors.

In my opinion school systems cannot "police" teachers outside of their contract hours for any reason -unless administrators agree to a contract paying said teachers for 24 hours a day over 365 days. The constitution gave us a right of free speech and such policing would be on direct violation of those rights. Wouldn't it?
As long as teachers follow the legal parameters of the law their behavior outside of school hours should have no bearing on their employment status.

As an art and design media teacher I see many students over their four year
high school experience. I teach graphic design,animation, Flash, and Photoshop, as well as AP art studio. We work together on an online newspaper on the schools web page.Students are required to explore digital media and create their own pages of portfolio work for review and assessment. Colleges do appreciate their pursuits.I communicate on line about competition deadlines, portfolio, public presentations they are a part of. When my students graduate they may contact me to tell me of their college or work experiences, sound out decisions, or ask for protocols on financial aid. They are now sending pictures of their weddings, children, military careers, and letting me know of their successes.
Many of them come back to present their college work to the high school students.
Being online with kids allows me to support, facilitate, and continue that relationship as mentor. It is alarming that those who will abuse the privilege/calling of teaching, will shape the policies the rest of us must abide by. As a mother myself however, I do understand the need for guidelines.
Many sites, that are deemed instructional by our college tech workshop presenters are also blocked by the state or district network, making the technology instruction unusable. Coherent adoptions of protocol, agreed upon by State DOE,District Boards, and College trainers should be vertically aligned. Google and check out "Your Vision Your Voice" Vision 2015 winners. My kids worked on this piece about their views of educational improvements.

Yes, we have a profession like no other, but we still have rights to be who we are. I think we should keep our spaces anonymous or private. I hope to start a blog, but I will probably say some ugly, but true things about school systems so I want to keep my name out of it.

However, I do not think our personal life should be up for scrutiny unless we do something illegal. One precaution to use in your personal life is that if don't want your kids to know your business, don't live near your school. I know a teacher who is a lesbian has a life partner and children. She lives a considerable distance from her job to preserve her privacy. I once lived very close to a school where I worked and had a relative staying with me temporarily whom I found out drank a lot and used drugs. Once I saw two young men come in my back door with him and enter his room. I called my relative out, took him quietly to the front of the house and told him that those boys not only went to my school, but that they were special education students at my school--one saw the vision teacher in the room next to mine daily. (Fortunately for me he was legally blind and did not see me.) The other one visited friends in my room occasionally but was usually upstairs. Needless to say they were off the property about 5 minutes later and nothing came of it. However, it was a scary situation since both boys were under 21 and had beer. My relative no longer lived with me shortly after this incident.

Privacy, of course does not extend to illegal activity. At one school (different system) where I worked a teacher was busted for selling drugs, not at school. However, since it came out that she was a teacher the TV stations were out there.

A balance has to be struck between doing what you want and being an example and if you are little wild, don't live close to your school and don't make your website public. The thing is, teachers are a microcosm of society as well as examples. Some are far right and march in anti human rights parades or have membership in hate groups. Some use drugs. Some are flat out drunks. I have known several of those. Some have roaming hands and rushing fingers and you just have to keep out of their way and pray they are not interested in the kids. If they are drinking it is difficult to do so. Some are far right religiously and feel it is their duty to preach to anyone that sees God differently from them---laws or not. Many are preachers or spouses of preachers, especially in the South. Some are crooks or embezzlers or take advantage of their connections to get kickbacks. Some are bullies and hate anyone who is handicapped, older, or not athletic and are buddied up to the principal. Some are slow or dyslexic but have connections out the ears so they can't be touched. A few are killed at school by their boyfriends in front of their kids and a few are having affairs with co-workers or the principal. Some treat their students well but abuse their mama or their own kids. Teachers are not angels, but, on the whole are probably above average in deportment and values.

I would almost guess that you were in a middle class system, because you talked about parents going over your head. The other possibility might be that you were the opposite race of your students and parents. Middle class parents are very dangerous. They go to church with and are neighbors of your boss. They throw their weight around. If you have a student who is stuck up or threatens your job, you can almost guarantee that the parent is going to be a problem. They are very sneaky and love to throw their weight around. Poor parents will just come straight out to you directly and say what is on their mind, true or not. (I had one, my room mother who was slow who jumped all over the principal verbally. There was one who had assaulted a previous principal.) Sneaky parents are one reason I prefer inner city schools.

The school's administration is also afraid of these parents because they have the money and connections to file lawsuits. I had one whose mother was a paralegal at an important law firm. Her daughter started threatening my job early on because I would not allow her to talk about sex and drugs in class. Another troublesome parent, her ex-husband was on the school board. Her daughter was very manipulative and so was mama. A third said she was a personal friend of the Special Education Director. She frequently acted outside of the best interests of her son and was a little on the screwy side. I tried to deal with the father instead whenever possible.

Often these middle classs systems value the parents more than the teachers. They will get rid of a teacher to prevent a lawsuit even if she has done nothing wrong. They are expendable. One especially brutal system noted for chewing up teachers and spitting them out complete with a bad reference, had a huge legal team. One they got rid of because a student was marked down for not turning it his homework. Never let yourself get fired. Resign. They are not supposed to be able to say anything negative about you if you quit. But don't do it until your contract is up at the end of the year.

Toxic administrations are why teachers need contracts, tenure and unions. Eventually the superintendent of one of these systems resigned under suspicion that he was arranging for a kickback from a computer company.

A good principal would make it a policy that the parent goes to the teacher with concerns first. Then if she is not satisfied, she can go to the principal.

Yes, we are role models - how about using this technology that kids adore and are engaged with? It can be used as an educational tool, posting homework, links for references, just to name a couple. One student told me it would be 'cool' to have homework and discussions on facebook because that is a program they are familiar with, not some random software application from the school's home webpage that is static and boring. "Grow up, you are teachers" ??? Just because one has a facebook page does not automatically mean they are acting like their students - one can have a facebook page and be appropriate at all times-which imo is modeling responsible facebook behavior

You might get outed. It has happened to beauty contestants. Protect yourself. Join a Union. Make sure you have professional liability insurance. You might want to talk to your union rep about this. Never, ever be without your union.

If you think you might be outed,especially if you have heard rumors, you might want to go to your principal ahead of time, preferably after you have tenure, and tell him or her. My pastor had a part time position at a church of a denomination that is part of the gay community and he is gay and out. He knew that he would be involved in equal rights organizations in the community. It is part of his job. He told his principal at the time of his hiring about this side of his life in case anything happened so that he would already know. He was hired anyway and accepted as he was. This was in a conservative southern state, by the way.

Lamar County is telling teachers that they are stupid and not professionals. Despite the good pay, Georgia can be real backwards. This is the same kind of thing as putting blocks on the teachers' computers and having Zero Tolerance regulations that do not allow professional judgement.

I was in a school system that tried to take away the teachers'desks to force them to do "stand up teaching", as though a teacher did not know when she needed to be walking around the room. (The superintendent who pulled this one also said that special educators could not be administrators because the did not get the kids out of special ed.---like we can cure the students but we are just not good enough to do so. He was incredibly conceited and his overpaid self lasted about a year.)

One really obnoxious and racist middle school principal in the same system tried to make her teachers wear uniforms as an "example" to the students. Uniforms could not be required in this particular state and most students, not being Catholic, were repulsed by them.

In a rural system in Georgia when the special education department asked for a telephone, they were told they might talk on it! However, the vocational teachers had them so the real reason must have been that the teachers who are usually the brightest are really super stupid---maybe because they think their students are not smart so they must not be either. This was before cell phones were common. A principal in Louisiana in a wealthy suburban system also had the same complaint just a year ago, but then abuse is almost expected in this backward state. Yet we had to go upstairs or to the office, a long walk, to even call a parent. In another system we had been ordered not to use our cell phones or even carry them. A child had a seizure and went into status (a potentially fatal condition where seizures occur back-to-back) and if the Department Chair had not used hers, he could have died. Then the teacher got jumped on by the secretary for calling 911 herself instead of letting the office do it which was protocol!!!!! That is why we let the Chair take the heat.

WHY IS IT THAT TEACHERS ARE THE ONLY PROFESSION WHERE THE EMPLOYEES DO NOT HAVE ACCESS TO A PHONE? OFTEN THEY ARE EVEN FORBIDDEN TO HAVE CELL PHONES ON DURING SCHOOL TIME. AND WHEN WE DO HAVE TO MAKE OR RECEIVE A CALL WE ARE NOT GIVEN ANY PRIVACY TO USE IT.

A principal in Georgia used to start lectures with, "If y'all were Delta Airlines employees....". I got tired of it and told him we were professionals not skilled labor. He had been moved frequently in the system because he had a problem with sexual harrassment.

Just yesterday, a poorly regarded Louisiana school system had a "fashion show" that ostensibly was held to show new teachers what was appropriate to wear to work. This is something that should be handled individually and only when necessary and with consideration given to the job of the teacher.

For example at one school the principal, a dresser, wanted all men to wear ties, but the two severe disabilities teachers were in danger of being choked if they did so. A dangling tie is something many of these kids will grab and pull. They are also dangerous for many vocational teachers. This same principal had to apologize to the Adapted PE teacher for getting after her for wearing sweats. She was itinerant and he did not know her. She was doing her job and what she was wearing was appropriate for her work. She called her coordinator The coordinator told the Special Education Director who called him and laid him out.

Interfering with a teacher's personal life remains a problem in the schools.

Why do you think it is so hard to get and keep teachers? Who wants to be insulted and treated like a child on the job. Deal with important issues individually and assume that we will behave professionally instead of assuming that we are ignorant.

Treat us like doctors and engineers, not waitresses and laborers.

We are past the day when teachers could not marry, could not be in public with a man who was not her father or brother, and who had to bring coal to fire the heater every day.

As long as a teacher is not doing anything illegal, he or she should be able to do what is right in her eyes and the eyes of the God of her understanding. In terms of the Internet, however, if she is going to post something she does not want her students looking at, she had best make her page private. No teacher should be disrespected, but you don't need to set yourself up for disrespect either. If she is a party animal and not local, she might also want to go to a bar in another town.

One thing however, is that in conservative areas, a teachre might want to be careful with her freedom of speech until she has tenure. I heard of a teacher who was fired because she had a pro-choice bumper sticker in a "pro-life" state. So it might be best to keep extremely political things at home, or if on the web, anonymous until your job is safe. Administrators can be real petty.

If parents are going to trust you with their children, then your life needs to reflect the values and standards of the community in which you work. What you do in private is your business, however, the Internet is not a private place (no matter the precautions you may take)and teachers should be held accountable for information they post there.