Teachers and Social Networkng

After reading the article, "Have You Googled Your Teacher Lately?", and completing the assignments on googling ourselves, I can see how the internet can be a helpful yet dangerous tool for teachers to be involved with.

After googling my name, I found little that would be harmful to me personally if someone were to see some of the information that came up. However, There are a few Jeromy Browns in the world. One of them is a lawyer who has some negative press about him on the net but I did not see anything that if actually opened and looked at would reflect negatively towards myself. There was mostly links to my facebook or other social networking sites like myspace used by a Jeromy Brown from Wisconsin. While there was not too much about my particular name, I can definitely see how this could turn ugly for teachers with famous names or names linked to people doing negative things in this world and how it could then be mistaken and used against a person who is merely wrongfully associated with someone with the same name.

Luckily for myself, I tend to use sparingly, sites like facebook or other social networking sites for this vary reason. Although I do use them, I do not put much personal information about my life or hobbies or interests that could be see in a negative light by peers or possible employers.

I do strongly feel that teachers, as long as they are not breaking any laws should be judged only on their life in the school or around students publicly, and that their home lives should be open to pursue anything they wish. However, with the day and age we are experiencing, I feel that teachers should be held to a higher standard. If we are preaching to kids as role models, we should be practicing what we preach. We should, as educators handle ourselves publicly as if we are on the job. In the community it would be easy for any wrong move or opinionated statements to be misconstrued and used against us. For our career and professional lives, I feel it only benefits us to handle ourselves professionally at all times while involved in the community.

The most interesting story I read in the article would have to be the Myspace example of the education student with the "bloody page." I think that most people enjoy expressing their opinions, views and interests on their personal pages, but if left open to the public or students, it could portray a negative image or give the wrong impression about you personally. I will definitely keep my pages private regardless, but moreover, I will keep my page as safe and simple as possible. I would hate to lose my job or my license to something trivial that could be used against me from something in my personal life!!