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.

Comments

UPDATE! Cory Doctorow just reported...

[Spy der Mann]

From boing boing's blog entry:

I just spoke to the principal of the high-school -- nice enough fellow. According to him:
* The kid altered the document after scanning it
* The kid was punished for mouthing off to the teacher, not for using Firefox
* The kid had been asked to work in Word on a resume (the assignment) and kept looking at the Web instead (and this was a recurring problem)
* The kid has admitted this and will be posting a followup/correction/retraction today

It appears that the student wasn't JUST using "a better browser". He was browsing OTHER STUFF on the web. Too bad.

Re:detention for disobedience

[pongo000]

I work at a school district in IT, and I can assure you that some (too many) teachers can barely teach, let alone manage to run a classroom with computers.

I work at a school district as a math teacher. I also have several years of experience in IT industry, and have a master's degree in CS. I can assure you that *most* of our IT people know little to nothing about anything that doesn't involve Microsoft or Novell. Which means I just deal with IT problems myself, because I can usually *not* count on getting any level of help beyond the simple scripted responses one gets when they e-mail technical support.

Why do I bring this up? Because this sword you swing cuts both ways: I'm *definitely* not one of the teachers you describe, and *you* definitely don't sound like one of the IT people I describe. I think it's fair to say that not many teachers *or* school district IT employees are what you and I would describe as "computer literate beyond the most basic level."

BTW, your comment about installing software leads me to believe that this student may have also violated an AUP that specifically prohibits the installation of programs other than those endoresed by the school district. Regardless of how one reads "installation," it's a safe bet that no one would argue that copying an .exe to a Windows drive, even if it does not access the registry, constitutes "installation."

Re:OSS is evil.

[gt_mattex]

This entire story is possibly based on erroneous information.

http://www.bigspring.k12.pa.us/news.php?action=view_article&article_id=2130

UPDATE: Statement from the school

[ashitaka]

The following notice has been posted on the school's website. Looks like some attitude was involved which would make more sense. Too bad the principal isn't prepared to provide more details about the use of software.

Detention Letter Press Release
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

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