Julia Hengstler’s “A K–12 Primer for British Columbia Teachers Posting Students’ Work Online” has given me a lot to think about in terms of teacher and school liability around sharing student achievement online.
1. I found the discussion of the role of e-safety officer (Consideration 5) very worrisome, because I can see this role is very important, but my school does not have one. We have technology support teachers, but the article makes it clear that this is not the same thing (p. 9). Some of the incidents described on the Kent County flow chart example are dealt with by the VP or counselors, but it is not always a uniform approach. How many schools have an e-safety officer? In areas where this may not be feasible, would a district-based e-safety officer fill the gap?
2. At our school, parents of students sign media and technology consent forms and parents have the option to tick certain boxes to give permissions. Also, our school district purchased Microsoft Office 365 accounts for all staff and students. Now, most teachers use Microsoft Teams to collect student assignments, which students upload to the app using their district approved, password protected account. At a staff meeting, we were told that if we used these tools, we would be “safe” under FOIPPA rules, but not if we used Google Classroom. However, Hengstler’s discussion of Consideration 4 and 6 makes me question all this. Are the district license and support, along with the consent forms really enough to “shield” teachers from potential issues of liability?
3. My last question is about secondary students’ choices for personal sharing of learning; for some assignments, we allow students to choose the manner in which they create a final summative task- for example, one student might build a Weebly site, use Prezi, or use Canva to make a project. What are the teacher’s responsibilities in situations when students choose non-district approved technology to show their learning? Should teachers stop students from using them? Should there be a pre-approved list of apps that is included on a consent form (thereby limiting student choice if they discover a cool online resource on their own)? Or should we take a more educational approach around discussing the risks and benefits of non-district approved resources?
Hengstler, Julia. “A K-12 Primer for British Columbia Teachers Posting Students’ Work Online.” 19 May 2013, http://heres-how.weebly.com/uploads/4/4/9/9/
4499967/ primer_on_posting_minor_students_final.pdf. Accessed 28 April 2022.
