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Student Given Detention For Using Firefox [UPDATED]
An anonymous reader writes "Several sites are reporting that a student has been given detention for using Firefox to do his classwork. No, really. The student was in class, working on an assignment that necessitated using a browser. The teacher instructed him to stop using Firefox and to do his classwork, to which the student responded that he was doing his classwork using a 'better' browser (it is unclear whether the computer was the student's own computer or not). The clueless teacher (who called the rogue program 'Firefox.exe') ordered him to detention." Update: 12/17 20:09 by SM One of the school officials was nice enough to contact us and let us know this is a hoax. If you are planning on calling the school please refrain from doing so, I'm sure they have had enough excitement for one day.
The teacher was right. We have to stop this communism right here, right now!
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
It appears the infraction was probably closer to being for disobeying the teacher than for using Firefox. While it exposes an interesting deficiency in the general knowledge of educators about browser technology, it isn't necessarily their specialty. (We don't know if this was some proxy of a teacher who was unaware of options for browsers.)
Without any more information, this is merely a potential story... I wouldn't bother sending e-mails to the school. You may want to consider first:
I think we can all safely jump to conclusions here and make some truly insane comments - GO!
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
What an inspiring role model for the next generation. I bet that in 40 years' time that kid's telling their grandchildren the story... "Yes, I never will forget old Mrs Wilkins, heh! heh!"
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -- Goethe
Our schools are supposed to teach discipline, which most people think means following the rules. As Stephen Colbert says, if the rules were logical then they wouldn't be learning respect for the rules, they'd be learning logic.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
Haha, reminds me of how I got yelled at by an irate "computer-science" teacher ages ago, for breaking a monitor (ie. turning it off with the big red power button on the front)
Be wary of any facts that confirm your opinion.
I wonder would he get an A from music teacher for using Oepra?
LiFe iS bEAuTiFul
Headline is a bit sensationalist.
I approve of the new story icon :)
It is a problem when the students know more than the teachers.
It isn't clear if this is a "computer class", in which case this is really bad because teachers should know more than the students in the area they are teaching in.
There is much more leeway for an English teacher to not know how to do integrations/derivations, for example. I don't know if this should extend to stuff the teachers use to teach the class, but it probably should. How can you use something effectively to teach if you don't know how it works?
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
Anyone want to contact his teacher? or at least /. the school website?
*stands well back*
If I have nothing to hide, you have no reason to search me
What is FoxFire.exe??
Considering that you can be reprimanded in certain workplaces for doing the same thing (thankfully I don't work at one of them), is this really news?
It's actually funnier the way the teacher DID report it... 'foxfire.exe', not 'firefox.exe' as the /. blurb says.
OHMAGAWD THIS IS TERRORISM PURE AND SIMPLE! As somebody who is in no way associated with Microsoft I must say that the use of browsers not written by Microsoft is a clear violation of our - their - intellectual property. Clearly this child should be executed for his crimes against our... their... corporation.
The Generation
I'd say something witty here, but I'm not that bright.
While Firefox is indeed a great browser, it is a largely irrelevant part of this sage -- kid runs unauthorized application, is told not to, disobeys instructions and talks back.
Boring.
Sidenote - Do the editors or the submitter start off the tags these days? This story came fresh with 4 tags...I thought it waited until "democracy" spoke. Wisdom of the masses et al.
Having worked in education for many years (and having kids), I guarantee that the student's side omits mention of defiance or cockiness. This of course doesn't excuse the idiot teacher, but I imagine there is more to it than presented by the submittor. It is astounding how innocent and respectful they believe they were after the fact. I imagine the kid wanted to use a better browser, the teacher got miffed at the install, and they both proceeded to behave poorly. Most likely the browser was just a catalyst in the childish behavior of both. And I say this strictly as having been the idiot teacher.
meh
There isn't enough information here to really jump on top of the school for giving this kid detention. I worked as a tech in a public school district for just over 5 years, we did our best to keep the school's machines locked down tight. But there isn't a lot you can do against a student bringing FireFox in on a USB drive and surfing the net, bypassing some of our security. (OK, there is a lot you can do to stop this, but I'm not going to debate that now.) The school may have certain rules put forth about running unauthorized software. The student was told to stop and didn't. I really don't see anything wrong with the dention. On top of that, as some others have mentioned, we know none of the back story. Does this kid have a history of being a troublemaker, especially in terms of the computer (we routinely had "reapeat offenders", kids trying to break into the school network and getting caught.) A little more information on the schools rules and exactly what had happened would be nice before jumping on anyone about this.
The important thing was that the student was not being entirely subservient and obedient to authority. Our school system *exists* to put a stop to this kind of behavior. I applaud the actions of the teacher, and hope they follow through with maximum severity.
I'm sure the student sat the teacher down and explained the pros and cons of Firefox vs IE in a clear and respectful manner, and didn't say "Shut up, hehe, I'm using Firefox. It's better than your crappy IE!"
If you are a jerk to a teacher, you get detention. I knew this when I was in school. When has it failed to be common knowledge?
I'd also like to know if the computer was the student's own or a school one. If it's a school computer, then all bets are off. If it's the student's, I would have said that I don't have IE.
Pulp Audio Weekly - Geek News and Reviews
This kid sounds like a real douche bag. Do your work and don't be smarmy.
... that the teacher even noticed the difference? Really, the displays of firefox and ie are fairly similar, and if you aren't looking at the very top or very bottom of the window, a layperson might not notice the difference at all.
I do wonder what version of windows was being used that the teacher noticed it called "firefox.exe" (and then subsequently changed it to "foxfire.exe" in the write-up).
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
The teacher could be an idiot for assigning detention over using the "wrong" browser in their eyes. But there are a few things that need to be clarified first: (1) what was the other browser option? It is fairly safe to assume it is IE6. (2) was firefox installed on the machine already? Many k-12 schools ahve specific access policies which forbid downloading and running of software on the machines. If Firefox was already installed on the machine, then (3) Why weren't the teachers aware of the programs available on the machiens to the students, and which ones were okay to use? An in any case, the school's surf-watch system is going to be equally effective in either browser. Unless, of course, the kid disabled it in the registry, downloaded firefox, and installed it. Oh well, whatever. Just goes to show how little people know these days.
The detention was for arguing with the teacher, I'm sure. We all know the school would be better off running Firefox as a matter of course; it would at the least be more secure. But the teacher should be able to, for instance, say "Stop using Word. I want this done in notepad."
It would be stupid, but the teacher can set the parameters of how the kids perform the work.
If the kid wants to promote Firefox, good for him. I'm sure he's sharper than the teacher. But the proper way is to write something up that lists the cost/security benefits and give it to somebody official, not just install and run the software.
(I'm assuming this was the school's machine, not his own computer.)
I wonder if the teacher actually knew what the program was, but wasn't sure if the school's monitoring software would work with it.
If not, I'm sure the teacher could get in trouble for not making the kid use IE.
Not saying its right, just saying its a possibility.
Just -1, Troll talking to another.
As they say in the article, the school's phone number is 717-776-2434. Let's teach this school a thing or two about the /. effect!
Given the context in which this story is presented, the teacher is quite ignorant. Granted, there is probably a lot more going on than what is in the story. Even so, I was given detention for talking in Calculus one day. The problem... I was at home sick. Needless to say it was easy to get out of.
in the description...
This is what I hear when I read this:
Teacher doesn't know all things about all things, makes request for perfectly reasonable action from child under his/her supervision. Child refuses on the grounds that child knows better than the teacher what the teacher was asking the child to do. Teacher gives child detention for disobedience.
Look, it turns out that teachers are not omniscient. Whether or not the child was correct that he was adhering to the spirit of the request, he was not adhering to the letter of the request, and refusing to do so is still worthwhile grounds for punishment.
Notably lacking from the report is what the kid's attitude was. If the kid copped an attitude, then nothing else would really matter. Also lacking is whether the student installed unauthorized software on the school's hardware. It could be the teacher was cutting the kid a break for a more serious offense by only giving him detention for failure to comply with the request.
There's many unknowns here, and giving the benefit of the doubt, it still breaks down to a student refusing to comply with a reasonable request, and that should be grounds for punishment.
Slay a dragon... over lunch!
He was using a rouge program, while I use Firefox, I have never hered of a program called "foxfire.exe" (sic). Obviously this student should be punished for promoting animal cruelty as well.
... but its not. gg making school network vulnerable!
Rule of Acquisition #19: Satisfaction is Not guaranteed.
Considering the teacher reported it as ".exe" that leads me to believe there was some sort of process monitoring going on, and the teacher saw that this one computer, presumably in a lab (else how could they monitor a personal laptop) which leads me to believe that the student DID install Firefox on school property and therefore broke the rules and should be punished.
Any chance that I would be outraged by this, which was quite low to begin with, has faded.
Pulp Audio Weekly - Geek News and Reviews
So, what is the take-away lesson?
1. You probably know more than the authorities do.
2. The authorities don't like it when you challenge them.
3. The authorities have the authority to do things to you that you don't like.
4. The world doesn't care that it isn't fair.
Sounds like an excellent, low-cost (1 detention) life lesson that will serve this kid well.
That's what you get for not educating your teachers when it comes to modern technology. (yep, i am being sarcastic)
Pure awesomenes
This maybe just about useing software with out asking IT before hand.
Did IT install Firefox on the systems?
Did anyone form IT even take a look at the system?
Did IT say to give the Student Detention or is just that IT put Firefox on the systems and the teacher is not used to it and the teacher thinks you can't do the work on it?
Is the class work coming from a old work book that only talks about IE and may even show the old IE 6 GUI?
It's sounds the teacher does not know that much about computer systems and is used to useing IE for the web and the teacher may even be the some one who may even think the same way about IE 7 if see is used to IE 6.
The kid is lucky he is only getting detention. If he were to use unauthorized software in many workplaces, he could lose his job and very possibly end his career!
Would mascara.exe have been better?
I find it hard to believe that the teacher punished the kid for using Firefox. He/she probably installed the application without authorization to do so. Not knowing what Firefox is, is hardly an oddity. After all, if every single being knew that there's a browser other than IE, far more would be using FF (or Opera for that matter).
Full Tilt
Just -1, Troll talking to another.
Jawohl: Befehl ist befehl!
That's why we all love the Americans,
especially in Iraq and Afghanistan.
This school educates for stupidity.
Students shouldn't use their own brains,
just follow orders to become valuable
members of society?
With a staff of ten to maintain over 2500 pcs and 2 dozen servers, we've had to forbid students in our schools from installing any software. Keeping the machines clean of malware, viruses and all that other happy-crappy was a nightmare before this policy. We don't issue detention, though - the student loses computer privileges and can't get them back until they speak to the principal. Usually that just means five minutes of getting a finger shaken at you and being admonished not to do it again. (This is surprisingly effective.) If a student needs a piece of software installed for something, the teacher requests it of us and 99% of the time they get it.
I agree with the other poster that said this is most likely a case of a teacher getting bent out of shape over the kid being mouthy rather than anything else.
*flame posts about "violating student rights" and "information wants to be free" begin in 5 . . . 4 . . . 3 . . .
look at the complainantt name: P BCalmear
Please B Calmer
come on!
The kid was told to do something and back-talked. Was he right? Technically yes. But sorry dude - you are about to hit the real world. Someone in authority tells you to do something - you do it. Then, after class, you go the teacher and say - "may I show you what I was using and why?" Have a discussion, demonstrate that you weren't being disrespectful or devious and you won't have a problem.
ReaLemon is yummy
Would rather be sent to detention than use Internet Explorer. The teacher should be fired for making such a requirement.
#!/
It was an online quiz / assignment, requiring the reading of material and the answering of questions.
Student used FireFox because it has tabs, and he could CTRL+TAB, CTRL+F to find the answers without reading the questions.
(The school is still running IE 6)
I don't think the student is stupid enough to use FF if IE is required for the assignment. Anyways, the teacher referring to FF (firefox.exe) as a program rather than a internet browser makes it very clear that teacher is completely unaware of FF & therefore choice of browsers is immaterial to completing assignment.
As others have stated, the detention was probably for not listening/being disrespectful as opposed to the specific browser choice. Most Schools have standards of what browsers they support, so if the school has standardized on IE, and that is what the teacher was familiar with, he/she had every right to ask the student to use the supported platform. It's not the teachers job to be hip to all the alternative browsers. He/She just saw the studnet using an unsupported application and asked them to stop. The student argued about it and got a detention. I hate Microsoft, but it's not all a huge conspiracy every time people!
Keep passing the open windows...
According to the document provided, the teacher called it 'Foxfire.exe'
If you read the letter, he had two warnings. This looks like a case of disrespecting authority more than anything else.
:).
Part of a teacher's unwritten job description is to teach students how to behave when their supervisor gives them a seemingly- or actually-idiotic order:
Unless it's something you are willing to get into trouble over or it violates company policy or the law, you obey the request and ask questions later.
I'm not saying this is a good thing only that's the way it is.
The teacher's actually-idiotic order not to use Foxfire.exe without explaining why is not serious enough to get into trouble over. The student owes the teacher an apology for being disrespectful. The principal owes the teacher an apology for not giving her adequate IT training.
The principal can start by forming a committee of students to train the teachers
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Better summary: "Student Given Detention for being better informed than the teacher".
IMO, the student should frame that paper and hang it on his wall. We need more people like him. And seriously, what kind of school education system allows teachers to be outsmarted by their students? Oh, right, the teachers are only doing their job, instead of actually LEARNING SOMETHING to teach their students!
Worse - the reward for challenging the system and trying to improve it is detention. Go figure.
Ok so the kid was told not to do something, which he continued to do and was punished. The teacher is a bit of a moron and has no idea about browser preference. My question is if they aren't supposed to use anything but IE, why isn't the IT dept using policies to prevent installation of 3rd party browsers? How do students have enough privledges to install programs?(sorry can't remember if you need local admin to install FF). But the subject of this article is mis-leading and the real issue is the kid not obeying the teacher or explaining to the teacher in a respectful manner that FF is better in his opinion than IE.
Insert funny smart-ass comment here.
Why was he being told to use MSIE? Unless there's a specific reason firefox would be unsuited to the assignment, the kid wasn't doing anything wrong and the teacher was being unreasonable.
There's nothing wrong with challenging authority, looks to me like it's the teacher who needs disciplining.
Is this North Korea we are talking about? The mind just boggles. From the way you treat your kids to the way you treat your prisoners in Guantanamo, it's not such a big leap it seems.
...then you should check this!
Focus on what was accomplished.
The student's contempt for his teacher (and the process that employs this teacher) is now validated.
How useful.
Yahoo! Pipes are awesome. How awesome? http://pipes.yahoo.com/jesdynf/slashdot
The teaching "profession" isn't known for attracting the best or the brightest.....
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
Maybe the editor, like the teacher, is dyslexic? It would explain a lot...
Either way, it should be "FoxFire [sic]"
Just -1, Troll talking to another.
where are the IT contacts?
they are the people that you should be talking to.
Much like the guy who attempted to buy a burger at a fast food place using $2 bills. The cashier had never seen one and thought they were bogus. The manager too.
Different from the guy who wanted to change for a whole stack of $6 bills, and was given $3's.
-- Stephen.
Another day, another non-story.
This is no different than a company telling an employee what software to use on the company's time and company's equipment, and then the employee gets punished for disobeying. If the kid wanted to use something else, he should have done it on his own time and his own computer. "Freedom" doesn't have a damned thing to do with it. There is no story, the teacher is not even the least bit ignorant, stupid, or in the wrong, and I have absolutely zero sympathy for the kid.
And the Slashdot editor(s) responsible for the posting of this sensationalized non-story should also get detention.
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
Where I work, our company uses something called "Webwasher" to filter for work-related (no pr0n) content and to scan everything coming in for viruses. The catch is, it only works when you use IE; using Firefox or any other browser bypasses it. The assumption here (and the tagging) seems to be that the teacher was an idiot, but they might be in a similar situation where using a browser other than IE might circumvent their content blocker/proxy/virus scanner/whatever and would be against school rules.
Portable Firefox configured to use Tor or a rotating selection of open proxies has and probably is popular among HS students. I'm not saying this kid did that but if I were admin on that network, I'd be extremely interested in anyone installing software that wasn't provided in the first place. The superiority of FireFox over IE has very little to do with this and more to do with the kid using a school computer as his personal playground.
Let's bog down a school with a flood of phone calls from people who have no business calling the school other than to complain about some kid getting a detention for disobedience despite a poorly worded article summary on a geek news site! /sarcasm
I'm sure "SlashdotMedia" will improve on all the wonders that Dice Holdings blessed us all with
As a matter of fact this particular crime would have been dealt with much more severly as the student would have been permanently expelled from school and not allowed to attend any other Microsoft Sponsored school in the world. This subversion of our student level vendor lockin program is a prime example of what is wrong with children of the world, how else are children supposed to learn that the only good software is Microsoft software and the only hardware that you should have will have a Vista Approved sticker on it.
So.. Three cheers for this fabulous teacher. They should have thrown a chair at this little brat when they kicked him out of the door.
S.B.
Maybe the assignment requires some quirk in IE (like strange CSS rendering) to work. :-)
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
You are reading way too much into this!. The school probably has a standard for browser software. The teacher expects to see that application as they wander the room to see if their students are on task. The teacher saw the student using a different application and asked them to get back to their assignment (it's not the teachers job to be hip to all the alternative browsers no matter how much of a dolt you may think he/she is!). The kid argued about it instead of just switching to (I assume) IE, and got a detention for it. There is no great conspiracy here... move along... get a life...
Keep passing the open windows...
How can you have any pudding if you don't eat your meat!?
It's really disturbing...
I hear about sh*t going on in the local elementary school in
terms of mindless hyper-controlling rules and the stuff goes even
above and beyond what you would see going on at Marine bootcamp.
There's nothing like some loser with the power to toy around
with some kid's future.
Unfortnately, in that situation you have to at least pretend
to be their b*tch. Fortunately, in the real world people are too
busy getting stuff done to mess with you so much. This applies to
the corporate world as well as the military.
We were behind enough 20 years ago and instead of improving
we're only getting worse.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
It appears that the student wasn't JUST using "a better browser". He was browsing OTHER STUFF on the web. Too bad.
Kids lie. Not all of them, but enough that the teachers have to assume innovation is an attempt at an excuse.
The solution, kick the shit out of your kids when they lie.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
American forces bases all across Europe ban firefox too in their base libraries and schools. Mainly because it won't listen to the locked-down windows settings for proxies and stuff. Additionally, firefox, with a plugin, ties directly into the Tor network, so it's deemed a security risk.
So for situations where stupid policies reign, maybe this interesting little project would be of help: the mozzie plugin for IE. This plugin embeds the gecko rendering engine into IE. http://mozzie.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page . In theory this should give one standards-compliant rendering, and the security of the gecko engine, within the framework of IE. Of course, depending on how it plugs into IE it won't protect you from IE url exploits.
Giving detention for using unauthorized software for school work actually makes some sense, and not knowing FireFox is a lot less outrageous in the real world it would appear to the users of a nerd forum.
However it seemed to me that the kid was trying to rationally justify his decision, and the reason (as you indicate) that the detention was given as a punishment for questioning authority. That is a much more serious problem, especially if you believe one of the goals of primary school is to teach the pupils how to function in a democratic society.
Do not download or install anything without prior authorization.
I manage a computer lab at a middle school so it I'm fairly confident in saying that I'm sure the innocent little sweetheart was just trying to help.....
Teacher gets a lowered grade for lack of fundamental skills....
success often occurs in private, failure in full view
Many, many years ago. Though it was the other way around. And, my case turned out happier.
So there I was, Fall 2001, my senior year in high school. As one of my classes, my friends and I were the tech support for the entire school, and we had administrator priviliges on everything but the county network and the gradebooks. We reformatted computers, did network stuff, set up teacher accounts, and so on. We also got away with playing Rainbow Six over the network.
At the time of my incident, the school's computers were all running an old version of Netscape, which hadn't been updated in some time. I believe most of the computers had IE 5, which even though it was IE, was far superior to the Netscape version the school was running.
Anyways, I was in one of the English department's writing labs, working on an assignment using IE instead of the school-sanctioned Netscape. The lab administrator flipped out, wrote me up, unplugged the computer, and sent me to see the assistant principal. (Now, this woman running the labs was a complete idiot... if anything out of the ordinary happened, even "please insert disk into drive a," she'd flip out and unplug the computer, then put in a work request... by the time we got there, she'd tried to turn it back on, and wondered why it wouldn't start up...) And to make it even better, I had just been in that morning reformatting one of her computers. Go figure.
So I get to the principal's office, and explain what was going on. She laughed, explained that the school was basically getting some kind of kickback to use Netscape, and told me not to worry about it. She later had words with the lab administrator.
The meek may inherit the earth, but the strong shall take the stars.
The kid wasn't ordered to shoot himself in the foot. He was told not to use an un-approved program.
Cut the hyperbole. Your example doesn't apply.
He wasn't being told to do something illegal. He wasn't be told to do something that could cause physical harm to someone. The teacher was in charge, and if he wouldn't stop he deserved what he got. The correct thing to do would be to stop and then talk to someone more powerful (like the principal) about getting that policy changed.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
How the hell can you excuse the teacher in this case? Discipline should *not* be a goal of a school. If the student does not harm other people by using Firefox (which I can't imagine in any way possible)
the teacher should just leave him alone and let him do the assignment. This is really absurd.
Is modded up. Boring.
The kid was given detention not for using an unauthorized program, but for not doing the assigned task. Apparently the kid was goofing off with some sort of computer game called "foxfire.exe", when he should have been using a web browser instead.
It's an amusing enough story, but to add little more humor, check the article again - they called it "Foxfire.exe", not even "Firefox.exe".
I always thought that Opera was the "rouge" browser, Firefox was "orange" and IE was "bleu". I'm not sure which would be "vert" - K-Meleon, perhaps?
.. paranoid crackpot leftover from the days of Amiga.
This is something I would have gotten in trouble for in high school as well. The way I read the document is that the student received the detention for disobeying the teacher for not doing his classwork. However, as we all know, he was doing his classwork using Firefox. Now, without knowing more details...the teacher was in the wrong here. He saw a process that he was unfamiliar with (Let's assume the student did not install it on the local PC, but was running from a usb drive one of the portable versions of the program) and made the idiot assumption of "student must not be doing his work and is playing a game." The correct course of action should have been to take a walk over to the student and see that he was in fact doing his schoolwork. The detention was then given because the teacher was embarrassed, and in classic form of many high school teachers (many, not all) a student is not allowed to know more than the teacher.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
we all know that the any given webpage looks gray and moribund and depressing in ie, but in firefox the same webpage looks golden and sparkly and cheerful
"the displays of firefox and ie are fairly similar, and if you aren't looking at the very top or very bottom of the window, a layperson might not notice the difference at all"
sacrilege! how dare you!
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The kid may still be at fault for not obeying what the teacher requested, but he may have been running a portable version of firefox. There has been a portable version available since 1.x . Also the kid might have changed the .exe name to foxfire which would account for the concieved misspelling (used to do that all the time to play quake on network, just named it something harmless like iexplore.exe)
They place blind obedience over learning.
"Considering the teacher reported it as ".exe" that leads me to believe there was some sort of process monitoring going on"
.." P. Bcalmear
..
There's process monitoring going on on a PC an 11th grader is using, I don't think so. The teacher also refered to the program as Foxfire.exe, not what an alleged monitoring program would report.
"Incident Description: Today in class AAA had a program launched called Foxfire.exe
So basically what we have here is a dumb teacher penalizing a pupil for not using INTERN~1 EXPLOR~1
Who modded this up Score:4 Insightful
davecb5620@gmail.com
Debating idiocity lends some validity to said idiocity.
busy getting stuff done to mess with you so much. This applies to
the corporate world as well as the military. Sorry, but that is just not true and I know that first hand.
Have you got your LWN subscription yet?
In the military, A commanding officer can order you to drop your pants and shoot yourself in the left testicle too but you have the right to disobey. Especially if the order is stupid, immoral, without merit or could get you into trouble. On always has the right to disobey when the authority figure is a moron.. such is the case here.
Blowing off a testicle would be considered an unlawful order. Only using the approved browser is quite allowed by the rules. What if the kid wanted to user Opera? How about if the kid wanted to use IE, but with that nifty share ware search toolbar he got for free when he installed Kazaa, which also has a browser of sorts. Where do we draw the line. Are you implying that the students should be allowed to install whatever they want, provided that they think it is better than what is on there?
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
I'm sitting at school right now using Firefox which I installed.
At my high school, Firefox was installed on all computers in the library and labs. I'm pretty sure they were the default browser too. It was very nice to have a somewhat tech-savvy computer support staff there...
I received a similar detention a few years back for using Opera on a school computer, which happened to be pre-installed somehow. It was annoying, but hardly an outrage. The filtering software the school used (Bess) didn't work with Opera. Also, they didn't want people searching around the C drive (as I did) or installing new software on school computers.
Frosty piss posts are worthless, GNAA posts are worthless and hurtful, but they are the least of this site's neuroses.
Being in a school/IT enviroment and not knowing all the details, I can assure you that the teacher had every right to dish out the referral...
The infraction was in the fact that Firefox was being used without it having been installed/approved by the school's IT department... This allows for proxy use... in which case, the teacher definetly should not allow the use of Firefox... that's how we do it in my school.
Yes, I love Firefox, use it in my office... but we do not have it locked down with policies to disable options that pose a sercurity risk...
Yes, but that doesn't have much to do with anything.
In the military, following unlawful orders is a no-no. You don't get to do it and offload your responsibility on the officer issuing the order. Stupid, but legal, orders must generally be obeyed: if ordered to take a hill with a stupid plan, you still have to try to do it, you just report that enemy fire makes the plan unworkable. I.e. you follow orders, but orders don't require suicide. At worst, the issue is sorted out later at a court martial.
School is a bit different - the Supremes have held students don't even get full 1st amendment rights while in school. The teachers are assumed to be the responsible decision makers, and students are not liable for acts they commit at the teachers' order.
Using a browser doesn't rise to the level of rights for students. The teacher doesn't want it, it doesn't happen. End of story.
Well, actually, the story continues, but the story is only that the teacher is an idiot.
And when said teacher was informed by the student that it WAS "suitable technology", what did the mature, responsible teacher do?
His/Her actions certainly do NOT fit the criteria for "mature" or "responsible" (nor "teacher" unless you count this as the lesson).
The entire incident could have been a non-issue if the TEACH had acted like an ADULT instead of as an immature child with authority.
Deal with it.
I actually had something very similar happen to me while i was in high school. I was in a typing class doing my excel work and the program locked up on me (as it sometimes does) and being a somewhat tech savvy student at the time i knew this super elite way to kill hanging programs. I guess i'll give up the secret, you hold down Ctrl+Alt+Del and get what is call the Task Manager where you can then end the "hanging" process. My teacher was so clueless about computers that she freaked out thinking i was hacking it or something and told me to stop what i was doing. I tried to explain the situation to which she said to restart the entire machine. I tried to explain that this was not necessary upon which she gave me detention. If schools hire teachers for computer classes they should know something about computers and software. Idiots.
authority figures are always to be given the benefit of the doubt. The person questioning authority is always a slacker, smartass, arrogant punk. Even if the authority figure is going against facts and logic, they are still to be given the benefit of the doubt an obeyed anyway. If they're complete idiots, we're to just assume that, in the larger scheme of things, it was better to let them have their way. Trust me on this. The alternative is anarchy.
Apparently you people believe that the student is there for the benefit of the teacher.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
"The issue here was he was told not to use it and refused to comply"
..
..
No the real issue here is a teacher penalizing a pupil for using Firefox
Who modded this up Insightful
was Re:so what? Score:4, Insightful)
davecb5620@gmail.com
One doesn't have the right to disobey without consequence, moron or not. That would sort of defeat the whole purpose of authority.
Proud member of the American Non Sequitur Society. We might not make much sense, but boy do we love pizza!
The teacher instructed him to cease using firefox and to do his classwork, and he refused the teacher's instruction. Sounds like grounds for discipline to me.
And at least on my computer, my Firefox link refers to firefox.exe.
My advice to student: learn how to negotiate with authority better. If you hadn't gone in-your-face, you likely wouldn't be in this situation.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
rj
The story is rather lacking on some important details which could totally change the way this story is interpreted. The way the detention report in TFA is written it seems like the teacher instructed the students to open their web browser and do an assignment, but didn't understand that Firefox is a web browser. Most likely this teacher is the kind of person that refers to IE as "The internet" and thinks that a PC and Windows are the same thing. Yeah, maybe the student was disobeying and deserved detention, but at the same time the teacher probably needs a remedial tech course before he or she should be allowed to teach a course that has a tech component to it.
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
So it would then be ok in your book that a police officer tell you to stop driving a Audi and drive only Ford? Teachers are to teach how to do things not what tools you must use. And teaching that students should follow orders without question is why this nation is going down the drain. You should always question authority its our civic duty to question those in authority.
I didn't watch this story really closely as it came off the pipe, but I can say that I have noticed we do have the ability to tag stories when they're still in the firehose. Perhaps this story was tagged there and then released, with tags attached, to the front page?
Just a thought...
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Okay why is everyone on Slashdot posting comments regarding installation of software, not using the proper software, etc.
None of the evidence we have states that to have been the issue. The issue at hand as stated by the detention slip is a failure of said student to be doing his work. Which has been stated as a task requiring a browser.
No evidence has as of yet been provided to any of these other claims. Only a failure of the student to do his work.
So let's assume that Firefox was already present on the machine. Let's also assume that the assignment merely stated that the work be done in a browser and no brand was specified. In which case, the only claim we are left was a failure on the part of the student to in fact be doing his work.
Which would then be an invalid claim, and the detention an unjust punishment.
***
What we have here is the typical situation of a teacher/professor who feels threatened by a lack of knowledge. A very common problem within the scope of the public school system (and education systems in general). Where teacher's egos feel threatened when a gifted youngster demonstrates a working knowledge beyond their own.
What a failure....that we even call such a system "education".
I'm reading here a few things that are truly screwed up:
1. The student was clearly smarter than the teacher.
2. Good for that student for doing what's right.
But here's what I say:
1. Whose fault is this in the first place? I would argue that the students shouldn't have the right to download or install Firefox if the school's browser-of-choice is IE. Sounds to me like the IS person (who is probably just a teacher who fiddled with computers on the side and got stuck with it) really blew it there.
2. Since when did knowing about an alternative browser make you smart?
3. The teacher is just a user, too. There is nothing that says they must become IS folks to teach their Literature, History, or any other classes. If they did, a lot of us would be out of jobs. In most cases, the teacher just uses the tools provided, just like at every other company in the world. (On an aside, ever fixed a computer that an engineer has been using? Guaranteed to be trashed. And most people here consider engineers to be "smart".)
Of course, this is Slashdot, where using Firefox, Thunderbird, a Mac, or Ubuntu determines a person's intelligence. And using said products is always right, regardless of the situation. The way I see it, that little turd kid needed to be sent to detention. Was his choice of software better than what was provided? Maybe, but it's still wrong to make those changes to the school's computer system.
The teacher needs instruction. Agreed. But that is the kind of thing to take up with the principal. That doesn't make it OK for the kid to disobey the teacher.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Things sure have changed in ./land these days. Never would I expect so many people to insist that it is good and proper to blindly and dutifully follow bad rules.
The kid spoke truth to power. Power was stupid. Power won. Stupid won. Bad outcome. And the wags are defending it.
Note also that the complaint does not say "the student was told to use IE". No, the complaint says "the student was told to resume work". Which he was. The order the kid was given, as reported, was not actually refused. The order was underinformed and presumptuous.
Our public education system in this country has always horribly mis-served students who are brighter than their teachers. We also have one of the poorest educational systems in the developed world. Why anyone is surprised at this is beyond me.
PS to kid: Next time, rename the binary.
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
And who said that it did? No one?
Guess that means that you've just attacked a "straw man" of your own devising. Good for you!
Well it seems that he WAS allowed to. Since he managed to do it. Now it might have been against POLICY.
Why do you care? That is a job. If you do not agree with the policies where you work, you can find a different job which has policies that you do agree with.
School doesn't have the same options.
The teacher failed to act in a manner consistent with a responsible, mature adult. That's it.
One day you may learn that being "in charge" is NOT the same as ordering people around.
My daughter, upon entering middle school in Montgomery County Maryland was forced to sign a computer usage agreement. It included among other things, a ban on 'other' browsers like Firefox _IN_SCHOOL_.
Only Microsoft's Internet Explorer (version not specified) is the approved, in-school browser. When I asked her computer science teacher about it. She agree 100% but said it was county policy and as much as she disapproves and recommends using a "good" browser, at school that was the policy.
TODO: create/find/steal funny sig.
Both Fords and Audis are licensed to drive on the road, thus a police office can't do that. You're right that the teacher should be teaching the concept and not the tool. But in the middle of class is not the time for that point. You discuss that with the teacher or principal after class. You don't just sit there and do a metaphorical "screw you" by ignoring their rules.
There is nothing wrong with questioning authority. But that wasn't the time or place, and it wasn't an issue so dire that it couldn't wait (like if they said don't give CPR to someone who passed out, that would be something that couldn't wait).
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
hehe.. nice example - except the CO would be confused as i don't have a left testicle
So apparently some kid who got detention 'shopped the letter and posted it online as a hoax:
http://www.bigspring.k12.pa.us/news.php?action=view_article&article_id=2130
Those who can't do teach.
Those who can't teach use IE
...according to the school. They just did a press release. Apparently, whoever uploaded the picture altered it. http://www.bigspring.k12.pa.us/news.php?action=view_article&article_id=2130&PHPSESSID=cf4be39ed120b93f823997c95b3533a9
Unfortunately, this line of thinking is all too common. Just try explaining to the average person over 38 that Internet Explorer is not the Internet, and that Outlook Express is not email. It's nearly impossible. Thank the Microsoft Monopoly for that.
His post describes the situation far more accurately than the summary. Really, how did TFA end up on /. anyway? Is this news for nerds? Is this stuff that matters?
But I am beginning to think that conservative might have it right on education, too. Would that student really be worse served if he were home schooled?
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
It's curious that none of this was in the original detention report, merely a mention of Foxfire.exe. It will be interesting hearing from the student himself, lets wait until tomorrow before passing judgement.
What document was scanned, what alteration was done. If Word was required then why did the teacher insist he use Internet Explorer. What exactly did the student admit to, why would the student need to post a retraction, a retraction of what. The report specifically refers to detention for using Foxfire.exe. This gets more curiouser by the minute.
Re:UPDATE! Cory Doctorow just reported.. (Score:5, Informative)
davecb5620@gmail.com
Lotta good that would do for people the USA in uniform being shipped around by a buffoon. One can lawfully disobey an order, but depending on the circumstances and spinelessness of witnesses, the CO or some ranking person can execute, imprison, or seek revenge upon the one disobeying, especially if unit cohesion is affected at a critical moment, or the officer is being embarrassed, or if the disobeying person sets an example that undermines those giving the orders.
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Pretending to be omniscient is bad teaching. The only point of giving such a detention is to try and instil in the child an aversion to questioning authority figures. Where is the educational value in that? Idiotic teachers who can't properly handle a teenager with an opinion play right into the stereotype of schools as place of indoctrination and intellectual repression.
I hope for his sake the kid has some teachers who can actually justify themselves to a child without reverting to "I'm an adult, listen to me or else"
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
Every school I've been to or heard of has required students (and parents) to sign acceptable use policies dictating what they can and cannot run on school computers. Running Firefox.exe is an obvious violation, so what if it is harmless, the rules is the rules.
From here my post is going to go downhill.
The kid was kind of an idiot bringing a web browser to school. Internet Explorer does all education related websites just fine, and I've never known encarta to install toolbars or trojans, nor wikipedia, google, or any site a kid should be at while IN SCHOOL. He was probably just trying to be a smartass, or misuse tax dollars spend on the schools computers and internet connection.
Also, I think its kind of funny that next to the article summary the foot is seen crushing the mozilla dinosaur, I think someone is a fan of Opera!
Probably the school has some sort of spyware system in place that depends on IE as well as other specific software and snitches on anyone running programs not on the approved list - so the teacher probably saw a red blinking warning stating the student was running this "firefox.exe" program instead of what the school's spyware was monitored to allow.
"Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
There's a note from the principle that says the letter was modified, and the information floatin around on the net is untrue. http://www.bigspring.k12.pa.us/news.php?action=view_article&article_id=2131
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
who knows what the kids is up to..... but the letter state he uses Foxfire.exe not Firefox... hmm i dunno about Foxfire man... might be some kinda new browser the kid developed :P
... led by teachers, kids are cajoled and numbed into becoming the mindless drones our governments want them to be.
... it's time for a change.
The fact that the kid was browsing the Internet instead of doing classwork speaks more to the content of the lesson than anything else.
What we really need is open schooling - where kids decide what they learn and when they do it. There's nothing to rebel against if you have to be responsible for yourself (adults like us learn this lesson the first time we live away from home) and it's easier to learn when you're in the mood and you understand the real point of learning.
In the UK there is Summerhill (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summerhill_School) where lessons are optional and the kids decide on new teachers - and Sands School (http://www.sands-school.co.uk/Home.html) which I don't know much about. In India there's the National Institute of Open Schooling (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Institute_of_Open_Schooling) which follows a 'learner centric' model.
As a product of 70s and 80s schooling in the UK I can tell you that teachers added nothing but misery and mis-education to my life and that of my friends.
It must be at least 2000 years since the first school - and we still treat kids like cattle
I was 16 at the time (this was back in 89 or so), and was in the computer class. Back in the day it was just computers 1 & 2. Anyway, this nameless teacher had given everyone the assignment of writing some basic thing to put some stuff on the screen and what not. Well, I was 1st done, about 10 minutes in. Now I couldn't turn my work in until everyone else was done. So rather then twiddle my thumbs for the next 30 minutes, I opted to work on some other stuff I had brought from home. It was just some piddly screen savers I had been working on, and hell my assignment for the day was done already, it was not my fault the rest of the class had problems with the stuff, and I was only in there for the class credits. Hell I was 16 and could have taught the damn class.
Needless to say I was suspended from school for 5 days and he banned me from all of his classes because I was working on non school related stuff, even though my work was done, printed out, saved to disk and ready to turn in.
Needless to say the guy was a complete ass hat who didnt need to be teaching kids. They in turn made in principal and then superintendent of the school system.
To this day I still laugh at this fool.
~DF
"wasn't sure if the school's monitoring software would work with it. "
Where does it mention 'school monitoring software'
was Re:How about the possibility.. (Score:5, Interesting)
davecb5620@gmail.com
After having read that detention report, all I have to say is that ******** is a hero for trying to use an OSS browser. ******** deserves a pat on the back, not detention. If more people emulated ********'s example, then they, like ********, would see how much better it is. And to ********'s parents, I say, "You should be proud of ********! ******** should wear this detention like a badge of honor!"
Congratulations, ********!
Also, the teacher, "P. Bealmear" is obviously a certain "S. Ballmer" doing a sabbatical in a high school. I see you, Steve!
The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them. - Mark Twain
Response to Internet Hoax
December 17, 2007
Recently, a file was uploaded to the Internet purporting to be a copy of a letter from Big Spring High School to a student regarding a two hour detention. The uploaded letter was an altered version of a detention letter sent to a student. Unfortunately, privacy concerns prevent the School District from giving a full explanation of the nature and source of the letter's alteration at this time. The Big Spring School District does have confirmation that the discipline letter was altered.
The reports, blogs and other sources on the Internet indicating that a Big Spring student was assigned detention for using the Firefox internet browser instead of Internet Explorer are untrue and were based on the fake letter. Detention is assigned in our schools after appropriate warnings are given, if students continue to engage in non-academic activities or fail to follow a teacher's directive during class time discipline can and will be assigned.
Sincerely yours,
John C. Scudder
High School Principal
So it would then be ok in your book that a police officer tell you to stop driving a Audi and drive only Ford?
Well... only a fool would argue it out with the officer in situ! (While arguing with armed men is an invigorating sport it should be left up to experts... like lawyers...)
The correct approach is to stare in disbelief, say "Yes Sir" and proceed to document the hell out of the situation so you can then take your evidence to the police chief, the mayor, or whatever governmental authority the officer reports to as well as the press.
Yes, the teacher is an ass... how can you supervise an course that somehow involves the web and not know what a web browser is? But arguing the point with the teacher IN FRONT OF THE REST OF THE CLASS is just looking for trouble.
I just remembered... I once had an argument about optics with one of the guys who worked on early semi-conductors... later on he told me I was right and that the only reason I lost the argument was:
In school, the teacher is always right, particularly when they're wrong AND foul tempered.
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
in school, college, work... any place like that, you do as you are asked. otherwise, its trouble. installing programs onto a networked computer that arnt authorised to be on their is a one way ticket to bad times.
portfolio
You sound like the classic case of a proletariat. Just do what everyone tells you, even if it is stupid, and you know it's wrong. It's people like you who allow stupid stuff like this to continue to happen, and probably more worse situations then this to happen as well. Kodos to the kid who stands up to his teacher, but its apparent that the average person can't even stand up for himself or herself when he or she knows that the other person is wrong and unjust.
If the rest of the class was using IE (or whatever) for their task, and the teacher wanted everyone to be using the same tools, they have the right to insist on it. The article doesn't say what the task was, but if the environment in which the student was working was unfamiliar, the teacher might not be comfortable knowing, for instance, that the kid wasn't cheating in some way.
When I was a kid, we wrote all papers by hand, as computers were not widespread, nor printers that had anything better than that ugly dot-matrix stuff. And we were typically told to write in black or blue ink; if someone wrote in red ink, or some other color, they were likely to get their score docked for not following instructions. Arguably arbitrary, even silly, but learning how to follow instructions is important, or you may not find yourself with opportunities to "think outside the box".
Having done some teaching of kids at various age levels, I can imagine what the exchange was like. Detention is not the end of the world, and without knowing the details of the interaction, the task, and some other elements that could affect how this was viewed, it's not possible to tell for sure, but it does not seem like the punishment is outrageous for the crime of insubordination.
The CB App. What's your 20?
The detention was for arguing with the teacher
.. he was punished for running FOxfire. Else enlighten us as to what he was really being punished for.
He was running Foxfire, teacher told him to stop, he didn't, got detention, ergo
"Today in class AAA had a program launched called Foxfire.exe. I had told AAA to close the program and to resume work"
Re:Disobedience (Score:5, Interesting)
davecb5620@gmail.com
I used to use it, but then I realised something...
In an effort to conform with internet communication standards, please note that the above comment is 100% biased opinion
The teacher should have stated 'open Internet explorer' then. His lack of specificity and obvious ignorance are now his downfall.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
How the hell did this get /.? A teacher basically told a student to quit surfing the web and do their work. This is news?!
No matter what the student was in the wrong here.
1. You don't know what the teacher was trying to teach, it may be browser specific. The website(possibly internal, some type of class web software) may only be fully functional with IE. The student thinks just because he can log in everything will work.
2. The directions were "do it this way" and the teacher had a reason. Imagine that; a teacher trying to get a point across without the class "doing their own thing" during the instruction. The assignment wasn't just "get the job done" with any method you desire, that falls under homework.
3. Just because he can use another browser doesn't make him smarter than the teacher. Although students often think this. This student may be in a ADD class where the point may be just following directions of the teacher. Either way once he does the assignment I would lower his grade just for that reason. "Student failed to follow directions".
4. He's refused to comply with the teacher. He could just as well been jumping up and down and the desk and refused to sit down. No matter what he is at that point disrupting class.
5. The student may be violating school computer policy; hence, the reason for being specific about which executable he was running. The violation may need to be reported to the IT department.
6. The student is an idiot for posting this on the Internet and will probably lead to more disciplinary action or at least a poor review from the principal/school board. There are better ways to address this, such as with the teacher, THEN the principal, THEN the school board, THEN MAYBE the Internet. But because he went straight to the last option he is screwed. He will do this someday at work, e.g. by going straight to the CEO or the Internet and WILL BE promptly fired once the CEO calls his supervisor on the phone, "Why can't you handle your employees?", he/she'll ask. Hopefully the school gets this point across now and he learns it.
7. We don't know the whole story.
And then you will suffer the consequences. You always have the right to disobey the law- but you do so at the understanding that you will presumably be punished as the law decides.
Each situation, then, must be judged along the scale of "Is doing X worth more to me than having to suffer punishment Y?"
"It is possible to commit no errors and still lose. That is not a weakness. That is life." -Peak Performance
The executable for Firefox is "firefox.exe", not "foxfire.exe", so I imagine that in the view of however the teacher in this case was monitoring (remotely? from his desk?) what executables were running on student's computers, it must have been flagged as an unknown application. Furthermore if Firefox was installed on the student's computers, then the student wouldn't have needed to bring in (as someone else suggested) a standalone version of Firefox, and the student would've been allowed to use an installed version of Firefox anyway. There's no way that a school should be allowing students to install or run foreign software, that way lie dragons! Of course if the computers in question allowed the student to execute a program from a flash drive or CDROM or from the public Internet, then the network setup and domain policies weren't set up very well either IMHO. It was poorly handled perhaps, but still it sounds to me like the teacher was following/enforcing school policy for student use of computers and was justified for assigning the student in question to detention for: 1) Violating school policy, and 2) Not following the directives of the teacher of that class.
Response to Internet Hoax
December 17, 2007
Recently, a file was uploaded to the Internet purporting to be a copy of a letter from Big Spring High School to a student regarding a two hour detention. The uploaded letter was an altered version of a detention letter sent to a student. Unfortunately, privacy concerns prevent the School District from giving a full explanation of the nature and source of the letter's alteration at this time. The Big Spring School District does have confirmation that the discipline letter was altered.
The reports, blogs and other sources on the Internet indicating that a Big Spring student was assigned detention for using the Firefox internet browser instead of Internet Explorer are untrue and were based on the fake letter. Detention is assigned in our schools after appropriate warnings are given, if students continue to engage in non-academic activities or fail to follow a teacher's directive during class time discipline can and will be assigned.
Sincerely yours,
John C. Scudder
Don't get me wrong, I'm usually not on the school's side, but a student with computer knowledge altering a document to gain popularity and to raise a cry from everyone on the internet over this isn't unheard of. So who are we to believe? High School Principal
You sound like the classic case of a proletariat. Just do what everyone tells you, even if it is stupid, and you know it's wrong.
First, welcome to the real world.
Second, let's turn your statement around:
Just do whatever you think is best, regardless of what the rules are, because you know what is right and everyone else that disagrees with you is stupid.
Is that the attitude you take at work, on the highways and in your home? We have rules for a reason. Your thinking that they are stupid does not mean it's OK to disobey them. I think it's stupid that I have to wait a red light when there is no traffic coming. Does that mean I should be free to run it? If you have a problem with a rule, challenge the rule, not the person whose job it is to enforce those rules.
In this case, the student should have stopped using Firefox, started using the tools that he was supposed to be using, and then went to the principal or whoever and challenged the use of IE over Firefox.
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Tase him, bro!
Everybody assumes the kid mouthed off to the teacher because he is a kid but for those of us that RTFDetention it doesn't say that anywhere. Nor does it say this computer wasn't the kids(I assume it wasn't but its just an assumption). Lastly the school allows downloading and installing if this is a school computer so it if it was against the rules to install things thats a different story but no where does it say that either. So really, it does sound like a power trip from someone that just didn't know what "foxfire" is. /FnStory
I had a teacher, who, whenever a student speaking in front of the class said 'um' while speaking would say "'Um' is not a word, 'Um' is not in the dictionary.
Once when she did that to me, I opened the dictionary on her desk to the U's, and pointed out "Um: a interjection used to indicate a pause in speech" (or something like that)
Best detention ever.
The teacher was in charge, and if he wouldn't stop he deserved what he got.
This is so sad.
Assumptions: the teacher is a complete moron and is expected to be a complete moron, and the student is wrong to speak back to the teacher because really, what can you expect from a complete moron?
The student is not at fault here. The teacher is. And people who think that students "get what they deserve" when they speak back to morons in authority are encouraging a generation that will be a mix of submissive sheep and very, very angry wolves...
Hoax, never!
Iraq billions
Except I did not say that. Whomp on that straw man!
Well, if you think so, that's your opinion.
I'd say that the teacher is the one who implements the school's policies in the classroom. But you can disagree with that if you want to.
I also say that the teacher failed to implement those policies in the fashion of a mature, responsible adult.
I'd say your view of school is more that slightly twisted. Why do you believe that such should have been allowed?
Why do you believe that that is okay?
Fascinating. Is that how you were raised?
It seems that you cannot accept the fact that the teacher FAILED to act as a responsible, mature ADULT in the situation.
Therefore, any and all actions should be acceptable.
Why?
So how many calls do you think they got?
Think Deeply.
A subordinate not only has the right, but the responsibility to disobey a clearly illegal order under the UCMJ (says nothing about morality - otherwise the infantry would be a whole lot smaller than it is now). As a veteran myself, if I were ever given an illegal order, I'd get hold of someone with some actual authority over the illegal-order-giver first and get some damned clarification first, not just sit there and say "nuh-uh!" a lot. There's a system in place for such instances, and you damned well better use it whenever it's available. Also know that if you do refuse, you still have to explain and justify your refusal in a court martial, so simply saying "no" doesn't get you off the hook. You'd better be fully prepared to justify it, because if that order does turn out to be at least somewhat justified and legit, you're fucked (e.g. you refused an order but didn't know the whole story as to why it was given, but it turns out the order was actually legal).
Now... a teacher telling a kid to stop using a program is not an illegal order. The teacher may be ignorant, he may be incompetent, and he may well be a flaming asshat. That said, his authority still rules in the classroom. If the kid had a problem with it, he should've taken it up with the principal and/or the school counselors. There is a system in place, and the kid can use it at any time. There's also this one last niggling detail - the teacher and kid are both civilians, and took no oath to do anything.
I've run a classroom before. I built my own network in it. If the student asked, I encouraged experimentation (Hell, I had images and spare HDD's loaded with them as well). If I told a kid to stop doing something, I explained the reason why I wanted it stopped, and listened for any mitigating circumstance. If that didn't stop him and the explanation wasn't satisfactory, I locked the keyboard and mouse, isolated the box from the network, and had the principal deal with the kid. 99.999% of the time, I never had to deal with it at that level - the kids were smart enough to realize that when I said something of that nature, there was a damned good reason behind it, even if it didn't make sense to them at the time.
I can grok the stupidity involved with banning Firefox and all, and yeah, it is stupid. That said, it's no excuse for a student to disobey the teacher like that. There are avenues and systems that can resolve the situation without some sort of stupid power-play egofest being triggered. That's a game the student will always lose, even if he is in the right. Far better to do the job right and know that you won fairly, than to get in a shouting match and go from a student - to becoming a 'problem' that has to be 'solved'.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Detention is assigned in our schools after appropriate warnings are given, if students continue to engage in non-academic activities or fail to follow a teacher's directive during class time discipline can and will be assigned.
Enough said. Move along... Nothing to see here.
"Don't let fools fool you. They are the clever ones."
Student opens Firefox, goes to the site, and starts the assignment.
Teacher: What are you doing, I told you to go to the internet and do the assignment, now close that game and do it.
Student: This isn't a game, it's a web browser, and I did go to the site. I'm doing the assignment now.
Teacher: Shut that game down right now or you get detention.
Student: It's not a game. I told you, this is a web browser like IE.
Teacher: That's it, you have detention.
Now, I'm not saying that's what happened, but it's possible. Until we get some more information we don't know whether the student did anything wrong or not.
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
Correct, the student's name was blocked out to create the "altered" version.
Technically, the student was assigned detention for insubordination.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
We all know this is a hoax now, but I still have to say this. The proper response to arbitrary and capricious authority is utter disobedience. The alternative merely teaches that being powerful is more important than being right, which is exactly the kind of thinking that causes most of the worlds troubles. There is so much good that could be done if people would simply stand up and fight back against those in power, but they've been trained to be completely submissive by people with your kind of attitude.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Where, pray tell, is this place known as "Idiocity"?
Or did you mean idiocy?
No sig for you!!
Second, the teacher was right in assigning detention. The teacher is in charge and has the right to tell the students what they can and can't run on school computers.
Just because you have the right to do something does not make it correct. For example you have the right to go into the street and shout non-threatening racist comments but is a very long way from correct behaviour in any imaginable circumstance. The important thing that many seemed to have missed is that the teacher is lacking in teaching, not just IT, skills.
If the reaction to something the students do but which he/she has never seen before is to shut it down without understanding it how is that encouraging learning? Nobody can know it all but the reaction to something new which your students come up with should be to ask them to explain what it is, how it works, why its better etc. That way YOU learn something new and your students get encouraged to think. In addition, far from losing respect, they will develop a far greater respect for you because you are being honest and respectful to them. Even if it turns out to be a daft idea you can at least explain to them the reason why your way is better than theirs which will hopefully improve their thinking next time.
It doesn't really matter what the student's opinion of the teacher's instruction was.
The teacher is a contracted agent of the school to whom the hardware and software belongs.
The student has no right to refuse to comply with an instruction to cease operating the school's computer system. It doesn't belong to him.
He or she can certainly lodge a complaint with the administration if he feels that running the software in question is normally permitted by the school's use policy. It may be that the teacher was in the wrong. It may be that the schools systems only allow the SysAdmin to add executables to the system images and FireFox was not supposed to be part of that system - for whatever reason. It is certain, however, that the student deserved detention.
Original discipline letter: "...was browsing slashdot with Firefox."
Ah, now we are getting to the nub of it. But, of course, as we all know, this is actually perfect training for the real world.
i\hbar\dot{\psi}=\hat{H}\psi
The school's response could be spin. I mean, obviously the letter was "altered" - it had names blacked out, red boxes around a bit, etc.
And the bit denying that it was for using Firefox instead of IE could be a 'we gave the detention for failing to follow the direction of a teacher, not for using firefox' thing.
E.G., it's possible it happened exactly as stated in the "altered" letter, but they are primarily punishing for failure to follow direction, rather than IE vs. Firefox.
I strongly disagree. The best time to question authority is ALWAYS when they try to order you around for reasons you find absurd. Yes, it's disuptive, and that's exactly the point. Questioning it at any other time tends to be met with a shrug if you've got no power to do anything more, which is exactly the case when dealing with teachers. However, you need to be prepared to deal with the consequences.
This would be inaccurate even if it weren't hoax. The student would be getting detention for not following the teachers directions. The fact that the directions were "Do not use firefox." is irrelevant.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
USMC DRILL INSTRUCTOR: "Put that left sock on right now! 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1."
USMC RECRUITS: "Done, sir, done!"
USMC DRILL INSTRUCTOR: "Put that right sock on right now! 10, 9, 5, 3, 2, 1!"
USMC RECRUITS: "Done, sir, done!"
I went to a strict parochial school, and they had NOTHING on the good ol' USMC.
More on topic, perhaps unfocused use of the internet is exactly why people don't get work done in the real world, necessarily. Yes, yes, they'll be fired, a good workplace monitors traffic and blocks non-productive sites, but to deny the tendency to take extemporaneous hour breaks in the modern workplace is to put Popcap out of business.
I don't know how you would implement a meaningful traffic control policy for K-12-- it seems like it would probably have to occur at the district level of IT mentioned above-- but in a world of PornTube, 2girls1cup, and a trillion other sites, maybe limiting kids' full access to the internet isn't totally evil. I know if I were capable of unfettered computer/internet access when I was in school, I would have visited all manner of unspeakable internet nonsense... and I did when my high school finally got broadband access!
I'm NOT saying the kid was up to no good here. He was probably stunned at how stupid his teacher was. But the general sentiment on Slashdot always seems to be, "Let all information run free all the time, as in beer and speech, no matter what!"
I'm funny. If you come see me perform, I will make you laugh.
Tor is a security risk (reference the people who snooped all the unencrypted e-mail passwords.) Can you protect against it with encryption, yes, but that doesn't mean you should invite the *insert favorite national enemy* agents to listen in.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
Here's my take on the situation:
The student is doing some web based assignment. Maybe research, maybe some web test off the school's server. Whatever.
Whether the student was allowed to use or install Firefox isn't really in question (though it is something to consider).
The student was told to do the assignment (which the teacher probably didn't realize didn't require IE, just a browser). He uses firefox. The teacher tells him to close firefox and do the assignment, not realizing that using firefox and the assignment aren't mutually exclusive. The student blows the teacher's demands off knowing their ridiculous. The teacher gets irate and has detention assigned.
I made many assumptions obviously, as has everyone else who has ventured to speculate. From my view, detention is a bit much since the teacher is largely at fault here too.
All the same, woo firefox!
P.S. I've done web assignments in IE because it was the only browser installed (and I the only real alternative at the time, Netscape, wouldn't work with the IE only site). Crash city! I lost hours of work that way.
Skiffy is Spiffy, but Ort is tort.
That's obnoxious. If this was the second time this happened, after having talked to the principal about this, that would be one thing. But it is a stupid idea to just decide to disobey as soon as you think some rule is arbitrary or capricious. This isn't an adult. He's not free. He's in school. Going over the teacher's head and getting them overruled doesn't teach the teacher they are more powerful. Throwing a tantrum in class by being disobedient simply shows which of the two of you are more mature.
The first step in standing up for yourself and fighting back is trying the correct channels. You don't start civil disobedience and other such things until that has failed or proven unworkable.
You stand up for yourself. It's just not the first thing you can go to. Making the teacher look like an idiot because they don't know something they aren't trained on does nothing but cause problems. The kid had other options.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Throwing a tantrum in class by being disobedient simply shows which of the two of you are more mature.
Saying "no" is hardly throwing a tantrum. The immature one is the one who escalates the situation, i.e. the teacher.
You stand up for yourself. It's just not the first thing you can go to. Making the teacher look like an idiot because they don't know something they aren't trained on does nothing but cause problems.
It would teach the teacher that, no they don't know everything. And in fact, their students know a lot more than they are given credit for, and deserve more respect. Students would be a lot more enthusiastic about school if they were just treated like human beings.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
...the student was punished for failing to follow instructions, not for using Firefox. Whether the student was right or not about Firefox being a "better" browser, it appears that there were numerous requests to stop using it, period. Maybe the school had an IT policy in place that prohibits the use of any other browsers then the one provided. We aren't given enough information to come to this or any other conclusion, however, and given the hoax letter all we do know is the student was being an ass. He was instructed to do something and ignored those instructions.
With the rise of "internet justice" it is becoming increasingly more important to improve one's reading comprehension skills and actually note what's being said without interjecting your own biases into the issue. Far too many people read a summary in a blog, the headline of an article or just the first few sentences and are unable to make a reasonable assertion as evidenced by this incident. Too many people want to see Firefox become THE gold standard of web browsers and when they read that some random student is being denied the ability to use said browser, they fly off the handle regardless of having all the facts or not, regardless of understanding the actual complaint or not. if you're going to be a bunch of self-righteous pricks, at least be educated self-righteous pricks.
and you want people to refrain from calling the school... you could... you know... remove the story...
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
The teacher is the authority. They said "close program X", the kid needed to close program X. The kid tried to prove their point, it didn't work, they need to do what the teacher said. You take the issue up after class with the teacher or the principal. The kid just wasted class time and acted inappropriately.
By the time I write this, we know it's a hoax. But that doesn't matter. If the story was true, the kid still acted wrong because they didn't obey the teacher at that moment. No one was in danger. It wasn't that urgent. He just wanted to look cool or more powerful. He was behaving inappropriately.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
That it was a fraud.
I am surprised that even I fell for it.
1. Why would the teacher call it Firefox.exe? They where smart enough to figure out the name of the executable but don't know what firefox is?
2. Why put down that much detail for a two hour detention? "After being asked twice the student refused to follow the teachers instructions". Or the teacher could have just put down. "Student failed to follow school policy."
We where scammed and will now probably end up on snopes.com.
I find it funny that you think it is reasonable to trust a students opinion on what programs should or should not be installed on a PC? Ever see a computer that is used by a teen? Ever clean the malware off a computer used by the average teen?
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Or it could be that a bunch of slashdotters were completely trolled in by a hoax and went off to the races with unfounded allegations .... nah, that could never happen.
that detention is a rather anchronistic measure to motivate students. I always find it amazing when clueless teachers try to motivate students to study by using studying or hanging around school as a punishment.
I am amazed to see how 1900 US schools still are.
And principals being proud about their being 1900.
Where, pray tell, is this place known as "Idiocity"?
According to Google Maps it's at the Art Institute of Chicago
Putting moderation advice in your
It's on the Potomac River, about 100 miles upstream from the Chesapeake Bay.
IIRC, I had to sign a waiver to use any "computer lab" in almost every school, which 99% of the time included a "Only approved programs can be installed..." etc., and failing to follow that rule got you kicked out, and if defiant about it, detention. If the Computer Lab operator didn't know what the program was, he had every right to kick the kid out. This (hypothetically) wasn't a college student using his own laptop in the computer lab. This (hypothetical) situation has most likely happened many times in many schools, what's the big deal?
Whether or not there is some sort of god, I'm not supposed to say/god is a word and the argument ends there-Smog
Had this actually happened I would have pulled my kid from that school. I think school is a place children go to learn, not to be instructed. It's a subtle but very important point. Unfortunately there are very few schools left that are places of learning. I understand your point, but it's one I disagree on. As this is a matter of opinion concerning learning style and the position the school institution plays in society I think we'll just have to agree to disagree on the theoretical outcome of this situation.
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
Hmm, sounds like somebody didn't have parent's like mine, when being home 5 minutes late caused 2 weeks of grounding. God knows what would have happened if I ended up in detention...
Sleep: A completely inadequate substitution for Caffeine.
I don't see any stupidity in banning Firefox. Unless the IT department installed Firefox itself, the student should not have the ability or permission to do the installation. We know the default installation of firefox is as safe or safer than IE, but the school has no way of knowing that the version the student installed is safe. Firefox is open source, he could have compiled anything into the source.
The school also doesn't want to be in the business of deciding which software the students are allowed to install and which they aren't. Better to just install everything the students will need, and then lock the machines down. This isn't stupidity.
Don't be so sure.
Both the Corps and the public schools can change a lot over the years.
When I went through the recruits were quickly in a routine of getting up early (before reveille) so as to get a jump on the day so there wouldn't be any opportunity for a DI (or the SDI) to kibutz that much.
10 seconds per sock? That's way too inefficient.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
The detention letter actually says Foxfire.exe - not FireFox.... ah well
MS, ALS, Aphasia ? http://globability.org - Me http://einarpetersen.com
He was being ordered to do something that could harm/disable the computer.
He was being ordered to do something that might prevent him from finishing the assignment.
He was being ordered to do something that might cause it to appear that he has done something illegal.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
I witnessed a kid in my class being given a detention, for "trying to break the school computers".
He was using keyboard shortcuts, instead of going through the slow laborious way the teacher had shown the class.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
Yes I have. Many times.
Where did I say that?
I said that the teacher did not behave in a mature, responsible fashion.
I said that if the teacher HAD behaved in a mature, responsible fashion, that this would never have been an issue.
I am frequently required to inform our users that the software they want to run on the company computers does NOT meet the criteria that I developed. But because I am able to do so in a mature fashion, this does not become a problem.
It's as simple as that. Treat them with respect and they'll treat you with respect.
If the teacher did not know what Firefox was, the teacher is hardly competent to teach any class that utilizes a browser.
As someone who plans to be a teacher and comes from a family of educators and school administrators, that's bullshit.
Teachers are not omnipotent or all knowing, and any teacher who is too arrogant to accept that they might be mistaken has no business educating our future, especially if they are so intellectually dishonest as to punish a student for knowing something that they do not. Some day the kids are going to be smarter than us anyway, so gracefully acknowledging that they might know some information we do not is simply common sense.
Furthermore, schools SHOULD NOT teach children how to mindlessly follow instructions and obey orders. It should teach them to think, and provide the framework tools necessary to doing so and participating in our culture without having to reinvent the wheel. Questioning authority is part of that, and one that we cannot afford to stamp out.
Try not to take me more seriously than I take myself.
When I was in high school (graduated in '91), I knew vastly more about computers than the teachers did. That wasn't a major feat considering the time, and I am now aware of how many things I thought I knew but knew wrong at the time. But in any case, because of my "vastly superior" knowledge, I was a total cocky-ass jerk. Because of my (perceived, at least) superior technical knowledge, I was a discipline problem and a disruption in class. I would "correct" what the teacher said and refuse (or at least resist) to do what the teacher told me to do, etc.
I should have gotten my ass beat for this.
Of course, at the time, I was really hard-headed. I'm not sure I would have learned my lesson if I had been punished. I was the sort of person who would get so caught up in being technically correct that I was blind to the concepts of being socially or procedurally or ethically incorrect.
I'm 34 now and in grad school. I took a computational linguistics class where we had to code an Earley parser, which is a dynamic programming approach to human language parsing. I was bothered by the fact that the grammar we were using was, in my opinion, half-assed. I think lexical grammars are a better (if still not very good) model of how humans process language syntactically. But I did not complain. I had a good time chewing the fat with the professor about it during office hours, because it's interesting, but there was no need for me to "complain" about it in any context. After all these years, I'm able to pull my head out of my ass and recognize that we often "simplify" things or make arbitrary choices as a foil for learning something more general. We were not there to learn about lexical grammars. We're there to learn to write parsers, and an Earley parser can be adapted to lexical grammars should I feel inclined to do so. Big picture here!
Let's hope this kid doesn't take as long as I did to learn to see the bigger picture, recognize that life involves judicious compromises, learn to function socially, and not be so self-centered that he makes things harder on other people just for the sake of being "right". (And by "right", I mean that he may have logical support for his hypothesis, but it's technical and the topic can still be debated. I'm NOT talking about moral "right" here, which is a whole other subject matter.)
At my school, we're not allowed to use Internet Explorer, and are left with a choice between Netscape, Mozilla Suite, or Firefox.
The school system is not the military. Thank God.
"The real life" is much more reasonable (with some notable exceptions). Most bosses just care that you get your work done and don't give a rat's ass what program you use to get there.
Yeah, there is a time and place to take up grievances. In this case, shock at a teacher's grievous stupidity is completely understandable. It was situations like this that contributed to me being completely disillusioned with school. School is insulting and irritating enough without this sort of trouble from teachers.
Most schools in my area (I live about 45 minutes drive from this school) are NOT tech savvy in the least. Another nearby school had trouble with kids logging in to the system and causing havoc with the computers. The password in question was the school's street address. (and that one was not a hoax)
He was using Firefox to download OpenOffice and use it to write his resume.
Really.
Maybe someone created this hoax hoping a /. link to the school's website would take it down :-D
1 (short ton / firkin) = 89.1432354 slugs / keg
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I find it funny that while in theory schools exist to help students learn about the nature and the society they are growing in, detention punishes students by making them stay in the school more, therefore implying that school is probably a bad place to spend one's time.
Here we have a great example of a brainless bureaucracy punishing one of its subjects for being smarter than the crowd. This student may have done something wrong (installed software on someone else's PC without permission) BUT I hope we all can see here that this student was smart enough to understand the deficiencies of mainstream browser(s), find a better browser, and install it. One would assume that society and schools should encourage children to take initiative, fix mistakes when they see them, and take decisions that make their life and the life of everyone better. This student discovered that the big bureaucracy they were subjected in was using a stone age browser, and he took a bold decision to fix the problem immediately without bureaucratic inefficiencies (the only problem being that he should have asked for some kind of permission first because the computer was probably not their property, but we can overlook this because we can't expect from young kids to observe complex society rules, so we should have used this as an opportunity to teach them, but detention really doesn't help a pupil to understand the concept of property at all, it only makes them feel alienated from society and think that they live in a dangerous place).
This is exactly how self-organised societies can function (by the way my academic research is related to self-organised non-hierarchical business companies and swarm intelligence algorithms), self-organisation is a good thing, and yet big bureaucracies like this school kill every spark of self-organisation at first opportunity. One has to wonder whether discipline and hierarchical control has become the new religion and it causes us to live in greatly inefficient bureaucratic McDonaldised iron cages (ironically McDonaldisation implies efficiency but in reality the associated bureaucracies create inefficiencies in many ways). Really, how much time have you lost trying to persuade your boss (if you work in a traditionally hierarchical company, which I thankfully managed to avoid as an independent) that your next project should be done in a serious language such as Python or Lisp instead of .NET? Or that Firefox and Thunderbird should be allowed on your work PC?
Also, why should schools be designed with teachers being superior to students? All humans are students, after all, and some students may know more in one subject than the teachers. For example, in this case probably the teacher knew more in some academic subject (let's say history) and the kid knew more in technology. I see this as a good opportunity to learn: The teacher could invite the student to speak publicly to the class about why this mysterious program "firefox.exe" is a better browser, and they could ask the student to write an academic essay analysing their position on browser choice and argue for or against allowing students to install whatever they want on school PCs. The teacher could offer guidance to the student, explaining that while some students may know better and install good software (firefox), other students may put the school in risk by installing malicious software (viruses), and for this reason some sort of efficient supervision needs to exist. The student then would be required to search online for examples of arguments supporting each view and come up with their own position on the matter, etc... All this could be a great academic exercise, and it would also offer the teacher the opportunity to *learn* from the student, specifically to learn why "firefox.exe" is a better browser. This is what I mean that everyone is a student... Even PhD holders and well-known researchers are nothing more than students, they d
From the school's website:
:)
Today's Lunch...
Chick Patty Sandwich
French Fries
Applesauce
Choice of Milk
Ketchup Pack
Nothing like a good old ketchup Pack to wash down Chick Patty and Choice of Milk.
My choice would be:
I will take the NON-expired milk please.
There was a student, and he was using Firefox, and he did get a detention.
However, the student wasn't supposed to be using IE, he was supposed to be using Word. He should have been working on a resume (his assignment) instead of browsing the web, but that was not what he got detention for.
He got detention for mouthing off at the teacher.
The student photoshopped the detention letter to remove the real reason, and posted it on the web (I assume he knew it would get a reaction).
The student is probably in a lot more trouble now than if he just shut up and took the detention. Even if the letter was genuine, it just showed that he was being insubordinate by repeatedly refusing to do what the teacher asked. Not the best 'hoax'.
"It's as simple as that. Treat them with respect and they'll treat you with respect."
You really think that if you treat EVERY teenager with "respect" they will treat you with respect?
What is worse is that the "teacher" never did a thing wrong! This was a fraud, scam, lie, a work of fiction.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
That could be....I never said "Don't question the facts!"
But having been in a number of such situations in my past with poor educators. It doesn't sound implausible. And of course, the final caveat of the school will be a failure on the part of the student to be subservient and cow-tow it the teacher, even if the teacher is wrong. Because it's far more wrong to hurt a teacher's pride...
this hoaxious teacher sounds as incompentant as my school's head of IT. the only difference seems to be that our head of IT would have given a student detention for using internet explorer rather than firefox if it were possible.
I will probibally get in trouble for this for posting this too. I put firefox setup on the public drive that anyone can access Friday morning and Monday morning I was in the office geting work detail (cleaning up trash for an hour) My school's phone number is 720 972 6700 feel free to voice your opinion as many times as you want.
When I was this kid's age, we had computer labs filled with Apple IIes and Commodore Pets. If a teacher had said to do something on the Apples and I (a Commodore fan back then) had refused and insisted on doing it on a Pet, the teacher probably would have had some right to give me detention.
In another few years, the Firefox/IE wars are going to sound reminiscent of the old Apple IIe/Commodore 64/Atari 800 wars. This kid was just being a punk, and he got punk'd.
Me, I'm no fan of IE, and truthfully, I don't think schools should be using non-FOSS software, as it helps promote the entrenched advantages that MS has. But if a kid wants to rail against MS software, he can do it in a productive way and get the rules changed, rather than being smarmy about having a "better" browser when IE would have been fine for his use.
And yes, I'd say the teacher probably should have been willing to listen, but gee, have you ever tried to teach 35 teenie boppers at one time? It's hard, hard work, and I, for one, stand behind the teachers who do that day in and day out, for far too little compensation.
The CB App. What's your 20?
One report says it never happened signed by the principal, another said they talked to the principal about the event.
:(
Me so confused
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
That kid got what he deserved. That'll teach him not to mess with rogue programs. The teacher has successfully saved the kid from taking the red pill.
It's amazing how many people read what they want into my posts. I didn't say "just suck it up and take it", I said suck it up and take it for that period, then go discuss it and get it changed. My point was the time the kid put up his fight. I don't think the middle of the class was the right time for that (hypothetical, since this was a hoax) fight. I can easily see a teacher who is unsure of technology doing this. If you have a kid tell you "X is just like what you said to use", do you want to risk X being something that will destroy the computers, or just tell them to do what you know to be safe?
The teacher might have handled it wrong. They could have asked IT or another teacher or even a student they trust if they wanted to.
The kid definitely handled it wrong. This wasn't something worth disrupting class over.
Questioning authority is fine. It's good. But there is such a thing as decorum and acting properly. This wasn't something important enough to need fighting right there. It could have waited until class was over. That's my point.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Yes, incredible as it may seem, this has happened to me.
Let me repeat that:
this HAS happened to me.
Schools (K-12 at least) seem to be under the impression that students should be locked down hard from the Internet - a policy I may not agree with, but see good reason for. However, this attitude has gotten me into trouble a number of times.
For instance, one day we had some assignment to look something or another up on the Internet. Since I had my laptop there, I decided that I would use it instead (it has a Dvorak keyboard, which I like better than QWERTY). I pulled out my laptop, hooked it up to an unused RJ45 jack with a cat5e cable that I had brought from home, and did the assignment. At the end of the hour, as we were all packing up, our "sysadmin" (I use the term loosely, as I could do a better job than him while in a coma) walked in and saw my laptop. He walked over, asked my name, and then asked me to try to access a blocked webpage (myspace, if I remember correctly). I typed in the URL, and lo and behold the site came up. The sysadmin looked puzzled, thanked me, and walked away, polite as can be. The next day I found my computer account suspended and a fresh new detention slip waiting for me for circumventing school security, even though I had never done so until he asked me to visit the blocked website.
The first detention was something that I could see a faint glimmer of rationality in, but the second one I got took the cake. This one occurred a few days later, while my computer account was still suspended. I was in the lab again, using the teacher's account (we needed the internet again, and my laptop had suddenly and mysteriously been banned from connecting to the internet at school) when the sysadmin walked into the room and saw me on the computer. He talked to me teacher for a while, and I could see her trying to explain why I needed her account and his insistence that I was breaking every school rule known. Eventually, he walked over to me and asked whose account I was on, etc. and told me to get off immediately. I complied, but before he walked away I asked why my laptop could no longer connect to the network. I asked as polite as you please, no anger in my voice, no threatening actions, etc. He simply looked at me with an odd expression on his face for a few seconds and then walked off. Next day I get a slip with not one, not two, not three, but FOUR detentions for "using another person's account" and for "insubordination."
All this hyperbole brings me back to my initial point: at a different point in time, I got a detention for using a version of portable firefox from my thumbdrive.
Having freshly graduated high school only this past June, I can assure you that this story, while maybe a hoax in this case, is not at all farfetched. I was frequently asked to stop using Firefox or Opera while simply doing research or otherwise school-related work on the library computers. I went to a public school in suburban Chicago. Of course, I never really offered any resistance when asked to refrain from using superior browsers, because I didn't think it was worth the trouble. But I'm sure I could have ended up with a detention if I tried or handled the situation stupidly. Microsoft rules with an iron fist at most public schools in this country. Now in college, I am able to use any browser I choose on the school's computers.
i am currently a senior at NDHS (Notre Dame High school) in NJ and my freshmen year they started the pilot program, 1 class of freshmen students purchased HP tablet computers mostly locked down by the tech department to prevent viruses and the like. already having more experience with computers then anyone else in my class immediately found ways around a few of the blocks and soon they opened them up a bit so we could manage them ourselves, well that was fine up until last year (my junior year) when my tablet (an HPTC1100 for those intrested) fell off of my desk and the screen cracked, no big deal it was still covered and fixed for free. but instead of just fixing the screen and not messing with the rest they completely reformatted my hdd and i had to re-install everything... soon after i found an SVChost.exe taking 100% of my cpu, so i brought this to the tech departments attention as it was a problem i had with the loaner computer they had given me while mine was being fixed, and what do they tell me the problem is? "o you installed firefox, spybot search and destroy, and adaware" which all 3 i had been using since my freshmen year with out a problem, and now all the sudden they cause my computer to fail at life... besides telling me to uninstall said programs, how do they tell me to fix it instead of taking action themselves? "give it a week and see how it works" a computer is not a pair of shoes, if there is a problem in a file it is not going to fix itself unless it has a way to fix itself. needless to say i removed myself from my schools network soon after and installed linux, i have not had any problems like that since that i did not cause myself by being an idiot
If he was my kid, he would have deserved what he got. He was right, but he went about it the wrong way, and that's what he was punished for. If he had talked to the teacher after class about this and was given detention for it, then i would agree with you. Interrupting the class was not the way to handle this. No one was being stabbed. No one was dying. No giant lies were being told that needed to be addressed (Nazis were good, the holocaust didn't happen, the government poisons the water with mind control drugs, whatever). He didn't need to escalate to where he did at that time. That is why he was punished.
The fact that the teacher was wrong (probably out of ignorance, if this wasn't a hoax) doesn't give the child license to act like a brat. Blindly defending the child since he was right (that FireFox is the same as IE) is the wrong tact to take here. The idea that you can ignore authority figures just because they are wrong is not the right message. If they are wrong, you talk to them about it. If they won't face facts, then you can eescallate. You don't start there... that just raises brats with no respect.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Ah, never mind. Just let me say, that name makes me shudder... [ducks]
Ok it was blurry in the picture but I could swear it was Mr Ballmer, anybody else see that?
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
Debating anything causes both sides to see the arguments of the other. Why did the teacher try to prevent the student from using a better browser? Because he it was some alien software program - he didn't trust it because it's different. People don't generally stand up for something unless it seems logical to at least them.
Too bad if the GP had the unfortunate side effect of breaking down your preconceptions.
Do not attribute to malice that which can be easily explained by incompetence.
We were doing a computer studies project, which was writing a game. Because we were writing this on PCs and not the Macs that were in the comp labs at the time we needed to work in the library.
:) In retaliation later we changed the system font from System to Runic. They thought it was a virus.
Lo and behold, we were kicked out of the library for playing games, despite the fact we were writing it. Not one to pass up an opportunity, we popped out to mcdonalds for the rest of the period
---- Design. Invent. Cheese.
Actually in the military you are not allowed to disobey an order simply because it is stupid, immoral, without merit or could get you in trouble. The only situation where a military member can disobey an order is when the order is ILLEGAL. Cut and dried plain and simple. Illegal is not synonomous with stupid, immoral, without merit, or could get you in to trouble (whatever the hell that means).
Furthermore, closing a web browser is not shooting yourself in the left testicle. If the teacher had instructed the student to do that your argument might have merit, but alas reality is nowhere near that.
$diff terrorists hippies
$
$rm -rf *terrorists *hippies
Ah, looks like damage control is in full effect today.
Computer-illiterate staff jumping the gun at any activity that deviates from the norm? Unpossible!
I remember when my brother was accused of "hacking" (hitting the escape key while Win9x was loading) by a substitute teacher. Although that was eventually cleared up, he was unfortunately "caught in the act" by a vigilant teacher as he tried to access the control panel. I forget the exact reason he went there (possibly to fix the sound), but due to his previous escapade and resulting reputation the school clamped down, deciding to waive punishment, but instead revoking his computer usage for the remainder of the year. Sadly, my folks didn't contest the decision (Dad was a teacher).
Keep in mind that this was only a year or two after Columbine, so teachers were wary of any suspicious activity.
The poor principal is getting a $$$$ internet bill next month for posting that on his site.
Hmm, currently I'm out of high school, in college for that matter, but back in the day I, too, was hounded for using firefox at my school. The only difference being that I was suspended, for three days, because the head of my school's IT department lied through his teeth about how since firefox is OSS, and because of that it poses a security threat to the school. Yeah, ok. I defended myself against the accusation of "having the ability to alter the source code and exploit firefox to gain network control" (the exact wording of what went on file with the suspension, btw) by stating that I had no source code with me, and that the MD5 sums of the .exe I used and the readily available one would be identical.
The IT guy's eyes glazed over at the mention of the MD5 sum, he couldn't even explain it to the deans! It's people like that that give IT techs a bad reputation, and moreover I was punished despite having proved that I did nothing wrong.
Classic case of "pulling rank" to save face on the Administration's side, they added in a clause on my suspension saying I violated the school's Tech AUP, which was conveniently revised to include what I did while I was serving my suspension... /rant
*shrug* sorry to rant, but what I'm saying overall is that though this story was/is a hoax, it happens.
If you are planning on calling the school please refrain from doing so, I'm sure they have had enough excitement for one day.
If you were planning on calling the school, then WHAT THE HELL IS THE MATTER WITH YOU? What possible purpose does that serve? There is no legitimate train of thought that should lead to the decision "I SHOULD CALL THEM."
If I'm working on a project and have half a dozen tabs open and the teacher tells me to close them immediately, that may set me back 15 minutes of redoing all my searches and finding the sites again in IE. If closing my browser means I'm not going to get a class project done (and subsequently hurt my grade), I'm going to raise an objection now, not wait until after class when it may be too late to get the assignment done.
How exactly is this a troll?
The difference between a very good and a very bad teacher is that the good ones will encourage you to correct them, while the bad ones will discourage corrections.
In High School, I was kicked out of a class for simply changing a screen saver. I was technically breaking the rules, in that everyone was supposed to do EXACTLY what the teacher said, and NOTHING ELSE but sit and drool. Ironically, at the same time, I was completely maintaining the lab in my another computer class, so the teacher didn't have to bother with it. Would you care to guess which was the brainless, incompetent technophobe, and which was the skilled and highly knowledgeable pro? I'm just thankful the 90% idiot vs 10% intelligent teacher ratio was completely reversed, when I went from High School to College.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
I don't believe it.
The assignment was to write a resume in a word processor. The kid was given a detention for ignoring the assignment and randomly surfing the web, then mouthing off to the teacher that told him to stop. I don't think that's unreasonable. Now, if he was writing his resume in say... Google docs instead of Word, then all these authority arguments would be relevant. However, he was simply ignoring the assignment and web surfing instead, so there really isn't a whole lot to discuss. He was given an assignment, he chose to ignore it completely, he was warned to stop, and then finally given a detention. I'd say that's both pretty standard and perfectly reasonable (unless he had already finished the assignment and that's why he was surfing... but I doubt that's the case.)
Here's the article explaining this.
I just remembered... I once had an argument about optics with one of the guys who worked on early semi-conductors... later on he told me I was right and that the only reason I lost the argument was:
In school, the teacher is always right, particularly when they're wrong AND foul tempered.
Only last Friday, I heard one of my college professors say: "Wow. I've taught this for twenty years and this has never crossed my mind. You just ruined my beautifully constructed lecture, but this is a perfectly valid interpretation. I've never thought about it in that way."
Of course, I've had some assholes for teachers as well, but generally, I've been lucky: most have been honest enought to admit they were wrong.
I'll probably be a teacher at some point in the future. And I hope I'll be able to admit when I'm wrong.
Ignore this signature. By order.
As if this was real...
The kid was disobedient and snotty and should be punished for it.
However, the teacher was stupid and ignorant. Ever hear of "the blind leading the blind"? Stupid and ignorant people should not teach, and the teacher should also be punished. People who know nothing about computers should not be in charge of people who are using computers, just as people who know nothing about fire should not teach people how to start one.
<sig> </sig>
It would be completely appropriate punishment.
This isnt about politics of OSS, but rather simple control of hardware on their network and making sure it is consistently running.
Guess what can happen in the real world if you do that type of stuff? anywhere from nothing to finding a new job.
The phrase "more better" is acceptable English. suck it grammar Nazis
Both Fords and Audis are licensed to drive on the road, thus a police office can't do that.
And both IE and Firefox are browsers used to surf the web.
There is nothing wrong with questioning authority. But that wasn't the time or place
If you can only 'question authority' at the times they specify, in the ways they specify, and about the issues they specify, then what's the point? Let me guess- you're a big beleiver in "Free Speech Zones", right?
I remember back in the day, I had finished an assignment and was checking out the status of Enlightenment in my school's library.
That nearly got me banned from the library forever(tm) - I was obviously looking up that there 'hacking stuff'. Hacking stuff is in quotes for a reason. The librarian or whatever her official title was - was convinced I was some evil hacker, apparently preparing to force secret government sites to launch nukes at Russia or something - all by looking at the Enlightenment home page.
I think that's when I decided my children will be home schooled. Or maybe it was when the mere math teacher who was assigned to cover programming classes at my high school said, with a straight face, that pretty much everything these days is programmed in BASIC. (This was circa 1998-99, by the way. And she was serious, not making a joke about the inept performance of Windows 98.)
Your average school administrator, teacher, whatever really has no clue about computers. They didn't when I was suffering through the horror that is high school; I really doubt it's any better now.
In Korea only old people are scared of technology.
The original story was a HOAX, is a HOAX and continues to be a HOAX.
There really are stupid teachers, worthless students, incompetent IT people and crappy browsers, duh.
Everybody loves a good moralistic argument because everybody gets to claim the moral high ground, no matter what their position.
Nobody really likes authority, except those that do.
Many of us have lots of spare time and even more spare opinions.
Now: Move along; nothing to see here.
Could the school be lying to keep you from calling and complaining? What seems more likely? The story seems reasonable and the teacher seemed clueless enough. I've had teachers like that. I'd say the school is lying to keep the calls and letters from overwhelming them.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
I'm glad it is a hoax, but it is sad that the state of the world is such that it is believable.
P.S. Reminds me of the "Student suspended for using PHP" bbSpot "story". Funny thing is, is that there really is a drug called PHP.
http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/pubs/scheduling.html
It's the first one there. " 1-(1-Phenylcyclohexyl)pyrrolidine 7458 N PCPy, PHP, rolicyclidine", some kind of PCP analogue ironically enough.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
It's a sad state of affairs, I agree. Steiner schools have a decent approach, though they are relatively rare. Your kid should be fine in any school though, it's the parents attitudes to a childs education that are most important.
... we'll have a big internet furor over whether a child was unfairly sent to their room. We'll start out assuming that the child was correct when they detail it as "no fair!"
"It is our blasphemy which has made us great, and will sustain us, and which the gods secretly admire in us." - Zelazny
Thankfully, this turned out to be a hoax, but what is really disturbing that "in the land of the free", schools are run like virtual prisons. Also, the fact that .EXE has somehow became a dirty word is very unsettling in itself.
I'm guessing you are a teenager?
Part of teaching kids to become adults is teaching them the proper way of handling things. Anyone who thinks you should be teaching kids to disobey anything that they do not agree with simply because they do not see a justification for the instruction, is quite simply being an idiot. If this had been a real situation and not a hoax, the student should have immediately complied, and then later perhaps sought to talk to the teacher and explain his side of the situation. Disobeying in the moment, in front of the entire class, is NEVER the appropriate way to go unless the request being made is clearly unreasonable (such as an order to strip naked in front of the class). There is clearly a distinction between things that are unreasonable and reasonable, and the situation described in this hoax situation is not one where disobediance is a reasonable response.
Have you been to a school that doesn't monitor what you do online, or block certain sites? I would be happy to hear about it, but it would be far from the norm.
Just -1, Troll talking to another.
Yeah, what these people who are saying the hypothetical kid did was correct do not understand the logical extension of their positions.
Say the kid was stopped by the police for something he didn't do. He knows he didn't do it, the cop is convinced he did. The cop tells him that he is being detained, and goes to handcuff the kid. Should the kid fight the cop to prevent being handcuffed for suspicion of something he didn't do? No, and if he did, the Tazing, Macing, or ass kicking he would get as a result, not to mention the then VERY VALID charge of resisting arrest, would be entirely justified.
In the described situation in the classroom, you teach the kid to comply with the teacher, and then seek to talk to the teacher in a private discussion and explain what he was doing, to prevent future misunderstandings. The teacher can then check it out with the school's IT staff or others who are entrusted to make those decisions, and if the student is still not happy, then he should continue to comply with the request not to run firefox in class while he goes throughs channels to see if the policy can be changed. That is the responsible way to teach our kids to handle their problems. To teach them that they do not have to obey someone in a position of authority just because they know they are in the right is to teach them the entirely wrong way of resolving things in the real world.
I am a police officer, I am issued a glock 18 sidearm that fires 9mm rounds in a semi-automatic fashion, but in my infinite wisdom I decide that i want a "superior" firearm. I do NOT listen to those in charge, nor do I follow the set guidelines. I instead purchase an assault rifle that fires 7.62mm rounds and fires at over 800RPM, citing that it is a "superior" weapon better suited for the task at hand.
Do you agree that i should; at the very least be reprimanded if not fired ???
In this particular hypothetical (since it was a prank, that's what this amounts to), I think it can be safely assumed that anyone using common sense would be able to recognize a web site (particularly if using it was assigned by the person in question), perhaps even to the point that one would have to carefully examine what that specific child was doing in order to even notice the difference between IE logos/UI and Firefox logos/UI which, for all that they are different, are not readily apparent to a casual observer looking from a distance greater than a few feet.
I factoring into my analysis that any individual savvy enough to instantly spot the difference between IE and Firefox viewing the same web page and be able to differentiate them (or at least tell that one was not the other at a glance) should be able to reason out that, while the software, or even UI, being used might be different from what they were expecting, it was clearly bringing them to the same information on the same website and in a very similar way.
In that case, the only reason to discipline the student would be a misguided effort to "save face" and re-assert complete intellectual superiority over the other students rather than simply saying something to the effect of "oh, I thought I saw something else, I must have been mistaken, carry on." which not only avoids extraneous disciplinary action for the child, but also for yourself if/when they DO take it to an administrator or IT staff member... it also serves to not undermine your authority in the first place by making your ignorance a matter of public knowledge.
And no, I do not agree that complying with instructions and then failing to tell them that you have not is inappropriate or disorderly in the slightest, nor is failing to comply with impossible directives. If the student was doing the assigned work, and was not playing a game, then they were in compliance to all the valid instructions, and failed only on the directive to "close the game" which was not open to begin with. Again, anyone savvy enough to actually figure out the name of the program and close enough to actually see it is also, clearly, close enough to see that nothing inappropriate is taking place. Update aside, this was a pretty strong indication that the incident was either a hoax or a gross misrepresentation.
Try not to take me more seriously than I take myself.
So basically you call me a teenager and an idiot, and then you call my point unreasonable with no explanation why? Nice ad hominem an argument by assertion there. The only thing that is clearly unreasonable here is the command to stop using firefox.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Hmmm, seems to me that I did explain myself. Perhaps you should go back and read my post.
His instruction to stop using firefox was not unreasonable. If he had told him to strip naked, that's unreasonable. Had he told him to strike another student, that's unreasonable. But please explain to me the harm in following the instruction to stop using firefox that makes it warrant immediate disobediance, rather than following simple problem solving skills to resolve the issue in a more appropriate fashion, in a more appropriate method?
What's the harm in asking the kid what he's doing before issuing an ignorant and wrong headed command?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
When I was in middle school back in the mid-80s, my school had a new computer lab. It consisted of a dozen Commodore PETs with tape drives. I wrote a little machine language program that redirected the IRQ vector to a little timing routine, and after a half hour of seemingly normal operation would fill the screen with boxes and lock the machine up. Before class one day, I loaded this routine into each PET, then went around the room executing the routine on each machine, waiting about five seconds between each one.
Predictably, halfway through the class, the semicircle of PETs started crashing in a semicircle around the room, with my classmates losing all their half-typed BASIC programs.
The computer instructor really got a kick out of it. I got high-fives instead of detention. He was excited for me to explain how it worked.
--I'm so big, my sig has its own sig.
-- See?
Because to determine if the kid is correct, and that his actions don't present a possible problem, cannot simply be resolved like that in the middle of class.
There was no harm in the student following the VERY reasonable instruction he was given, and then he could have pursued available options AFTER the fact to resolve the issue. Disobedience in the moment is NOT a reasonable course of action for the student, and would CERTAINLY warrant displinary action, and detention is not unreasonable.
about 4 years ago in high school. The IT head at our school called me down to his office to give me a detention for installing firefox on a school computer. About a year or so after that incident, every friggin computer in the school had firefox installed and they crippled IE so that no one would use it.
This made the news!?
My friend's son *was* actually given a detention for using FireFox on his school laptop as it 'posed a security risk to the school network' or some rubbish, in other words they couldn't control the inner-workings of the software as they could I.E because the school techs had fuck all experience with FireFox. His laptop was then formatted and reinstalled, a common practise at this school when a student has problems/games/porn etc. on/with their computers.
In Australia, Rural Victoria. The school (private) mandates the High School students have laptops with school loaded software.
That pretty much narrows it down to around 3 or 4 schools, probably less.....
While its been reported that this instance is a hoax, I believe that there are many many badly misinformed teachers out there who insist on providing sub-standard tools for students. "We insist that you use a Ticonderoga #5 pencil, and anything else is absolutely FORBIDDEN!!!" What rubbish. Learning in part, means making good choices, and because of the choice performing at a higher level. Books, pencils, pens, software. Picking well can increase productivity. This is what he did (or not as reported, but many others no doubt have, and received similar punishments). Instead of these people, nearly adult, who have made wise choices being lauded for their good choices, they are being chastised because they do not conform to the (poorly thought out, ill-performing, malware infested, overpriced, underpowered) norm that is Internet Exploder (and related ilk). Too many times have I seen articles like this, with morons *MORONS*!! defending poor software choices like Internet Exploder. For SHAME! A bad choice is a bad choice. Defending rape, defending sodomy, defending incest "For the good name of the family" is like defending Internet Exploder here. Bad is bad! Calling a spade a spade is where things should begin. Replies like "Thats just the way it is" really start looking stupid. If 'its a management issue not to use Firefox', then replace management, because they don't know enough about software to make good decisions.
I remember back in middle school when I was called out of the middle of class to change a computer's desktop resolution back to 640x480 or something like that because they didn't know how.
is todays lunch...
Honey BBQ Rib Sandwich
Potato Puffs
Orange Wedges
Choice of Milk
yum?
C'mon slashdot. When Anon accuses you of sloppy fact checking, you've got real problems.
http://orz.4chan.org/n/res/530717.html
If the teacher cannot admit that he is proven wrong by a student, (s)he is a lousy teacher.
Thanks for the link. That looks very interesting.
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
Am I the only one NOT surprised by the knee jerk reactions (pro and con) to this hoax?
Get a life, people. You got sucked in by this one. I wonder how many other snit fits have been triggered by bull on the internet. This was a brilliant hoax. It got you going. Look at all the slather and froth above. Makes me wonder if it is worth reading some of them.
Ok, think up a similarly bogus ploy, but first set up a telemarketing office to receive the irate phone calls. When outraged do-gooders call, tell them that they can help support the freedom of whoever seems victimized by donating to save-the-whatever org.
Just make sure its an off-shore office.
Normally I ascribe all life to intelligent design, but in your case I'll make an exception.
The issue here is that there is a very big difference between being told to do something by a cop, and being told to do something by a teacher. Of course we know this didn't happen at this point, but had it happened, depending on how the teacher and the student react completely changes who is at fault. If the teacher told the student to close the program and open the web browser and the student tried to explain that Firefox is a web browser and got detention, then the teacher is in the wrong. If the teacher told the kid that Firefox wasn't approved and that he has to use IE but he continued to argue over it, or started yelling, then the student is wrong. Teachers do not get a free pass on something just because they're ignorant of it. If the teacher doesn't understand something and a student attempts to explain it, it's the duty of that teacher to listen to the student and learn, just as it's the duty of the student to listen and learn from the teacher. The critical distinction here is that the student should listen and learn, not listen and obey, they aren't there to be commanded. Learning is about the free exchange of ideas, and just because the knowledge is trying to pass from the student to the teacher doesn't change that.
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
Thanks for the response. I'm glad that someone else here seems to see and agree with my point.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
A lot of this depends on the district, and the infrastructure. I used to work as a school district tech in a mid-sized city in Western Canada. Pay was decent, and while many teachers were old-fashioned, lazy, or just plain not very bright, a good number of them were still in-touch enough to go by with more recent software/hardware. Did they complain when we switched browsers to firefox, well not so much. Did they complain about openoffice, quite a lot (until the kids figured the software out for them). Did they complain when we moved to a linux-based model... hell yes, but generally before the switch even occurred. Once things actually happened and their POS Pentium-1 Win98 boxes were sent away, there is definitely a noticeable amount of complaining but it was mixed with something of a resigned acceptance on the part of many, and for some there was even a promising interest in something new. In terms of web-based tools usage was definitely superior though, with teachers getting into all sorts of neat thigns.
Now that I've moved to more central-Eastern Canada, I don't work in education anymore. I have been to some of the local schools and I'd say that the state of IT here is very, very sad compared to where I came from. Hopefully by the time I have kids in school things will have improved, or perhaps I'll move back to my hometown. It does seem that larger cities actually have lesser budgets for IT in education, and in general the quality of teaching staff and pay-rate is comparably lesser.
If the teacher told the student to close firefox, end of story, close firefox, work the rest out later. There is not time in the middle of a class working on an assignment to explain it to the teacher and get approval, like I said, there is a time and a place for doing that, and the middle of a class is NOT the time.
What, pray tell, is that ASCII art supposed to be? It looks like Alice the Goon from the Moon (Popeye reference) riding a bike. Were you thinking of something more like this perhaps?
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
I know this is a hoax, but something very similar happened to me while I was in school.
:) ;)
If the student had installed Firefox, then that would have been improper and he should have been admonished. The teacher should of have explained how doing so disrespected the school by his misuse of property that was not his own.
Installing Firefox is not the same as installing Kazaa, some random browser add-on, etc. I don't think detention and removal from class was warranted in that case.
If Firefox was already present on the system, then the teacher was just being arrogant and should be disciplined by the administration.
I worry about teachers that act like that. They think they know as much or more than IT and can abuse their position of power over students by forcing their views on the students. That's just asking for trouble, especially when some of the students may actually know more then the teacher.
My specific experience occurred in a class that I was not even taking. An acquaintance of mine took it upon himself to format every computer in the lab and then destroy the Novel server. Of course, to add to the hilarity, he left a single file on the server which effectively said, "The class blows, the teacher blows, I did it" with my name at the bottom. My sister (while in the class) had made the comment in the beginning of the school year, that I was "very smart", and a "hacker". That had put the teacher and myself on an inevitable path to a showdown at the O.K corral. This teacher repeatedly campaigned to have my access removed from any system at school. The library was made off limits to me simply because it had a computer connected to the network. This was BEFORE the aforementioned hilarious Novel server incident. After the incident the teacher, in a forensic triumph discovering my "fingerprints" at the scene of the crime, attempted to have me expelled. It was quite serious. There was a parent teacher conference with the principal and members of the board (private school) in attendance. Thankfully, cooler heads prevailed and the complete lack of any evidence or motives saved me.
There had never been any evidence and I had never taken any classes with her, yet she still decided to declare war on me simply because I was purported to be quite knowledgeable about computers, networking, security, and of course Linux.
The article of course is a hoax, but teachers like this do exist. I am sure there are plenty of kids out there that are arrogant and act superior simply because they use a non-IE browser or some other open source project. Heck, I was one of them. However, there are plenty of teachers that are just the same if not worse. The difference is that the teachers have the power to abuse. The article is lacking in information and seems to bait people into attacking the administration, but nonetheless it does remind me of the teacher that was just like the one in the letter.
P.S - Yes I am using Firefox right now and it is better then IE
P.P.S - No, I did not turn rat on the guy who actually did it. I extracted my bloody vengeance on him afterwards.. but that is a whole other post that needs to wait for the statute of limitations
You're an idiot. Not for replying to a blatant troll, though that didn't help. You're just an idiot, in general.
I'm ashamed to admit this, but, I actually read your posting history before making this determination.
I feel sullied, having done so - it was an excursion that left me feeling embarrassed for you, and so, I implore you: Please do not post to Slashdot anymore, as we've suffered long enough.
Thanks in advance,
The Rest of Us
P.S. To get Foe'd by a Slashdot Editor pretty much clinches it: Hell, they've put up with me, in my non-AC form, for years...
Come back when you grow some pubes kid... The name of the game is to get foed by Pudge.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
Yes it's true that the kid maybe didn't comply immediately, but assuming all he did was argue his point, the real failing is on the school for not countering his arguments with logical reasons. Schools that only teach because I said so are the worst kind. They should only react with disciplinary measures in the face of malicious or illogical disobedience.