Unfiltered
About ten days ago we switched web filters at school. If you have ever been involved in taking on such a task you know there are many hurdles involved in the process. Trying to work through the setup process with an active system causes many "hiccups" for all involved. When the filter is functioning as desired you will hardly notice it is there. Until the filter is fine tuned many of the sites people are used to going to throughout the day are blocked. Some people are very patient and wait for the situation improve. Some people go into panic mode immediately because the plan they had for their lesson suddenly is not possible. A seasoned teacher would have a few alternatives on the back burner knowing that at any given moment things could go awry and you need to move to plan B or C (in some cases you get to plan Z).
Why do we need this intrusion of big brother telling us what we can and cannot view on the Internet? This is a free country, so we should be able to see what we want! The short answer is if we want to continue to get federal assistance for our school, we need to beagle to prove. We have certain safeguards in place. How stringent those protections should be is very debatable.
Ideally, we would not need the protection afforded by a content filter. Ideally, there would be no malicious sites or sites that attempt to exploit others that our students could stumble on. Unfortunately we do not live in an ideal world. Because of that we need to set up fences for our students. That is the entire point of the filter. The debate with the filter, for most people, is how high should the fence be. Some people want a pretty white picket fence that is there for decorative purposes and to keep the neighbor's chihuahua from digging in your flower bed. Others want the ten foot electrified chain link fence complete with razor wire. The ideal situation is probably somewhere in the middle.
Another way to think of a filter is like the tuner on the stereo. If you use the manual tuner, you can "fine tune" the signal by making minor changes in the frequency. Trying to set the content filter is much the same way. If you are off just a little you get more information than you need and the resulting experience much like static. If you make the filter to restrictive it is like being stuck on the same station and they keep repeating the same song all day. No one likes static, and no. One likes being stuck on the same song all day either (bad analogy, I know).
My point is this, life in education cannot be unfiltered. If parents and teachers were able to successfully convey the dangers involved in living life without safeguards in place and students could all be trusted to do what is best for them and others, then filtering would not be necessary.
What other thoughts do you have about content filters in education?
Why do we need this intrusion of big brother telling us what we can and cannot view on the Internet? This is a free country, so we should be able to see what we want! The short answer is if we want to continue to get federal assistance for our school, we need to beagle to prove. We have certain safeguards in place. How stringent those protections should be is very debatable.
Ideally, we would not need the protection afforded by a content filter. Ideally, there would be no malicious sites or sites that attempt to exploit others that our students could stumble on. Unfortunately we do not live in an ideal world. Because of that we need to set up fences for our students. That is the entire point of the filter. The debate with the filter, for most people, is how high should the fence be. Some people want a pretty white picket fence that is there for decorative purposes and to keep the neighbor's chihuahua from digging in your flower bed. Others want the ten foot electrified chain link fence complete with razor wire. The ideal situation is probably somewhere in the middle.
Another way to think of a filter is like the tuner on the stereo. If you use the manual tuner, you can "fine tune" the signal by making minor changes in the frequency. Trying to set the content filter is much the same way. If you are off just a little you get more information than you need and the resulting experience much like static. If you make the filter to restrictive it is like being stuck on the same station and they keep repeating the same song all day. No one likes static, and no. One likes being stuck on the same song all day either (bad analogy, I know).
My point is this, life in education cannot be unfiltered. If parents and teachers were able to successfully convey the dangers involved in living life without safeguards in place and students could all be trusted to do what is best for them and others, then filtering would not be necessary.
What other thoughts do you have about content filters in education?
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