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

OSS is evil.

[jez9999]

The teacher was right. We have to stop this communism right here, right now!

Re:OSS is evil.

[ArcherB]

The teacher was right.

Well, the teacher was right... and wrong.

First, the teacher was wrong for not knowing what FireFox (FoxFire) is. Any teacher with a computer in the classroom should have AT LEAST that level of knowledge.

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. If a student is running an application and the teacher tells the student to close it, the student needs to close it, period, end of story. It's no different in the real world. If an IT director tells you shut down Cain&Able, you can get fired if you don't. It doesn't matter that the IT director doesn't know what Cain&Able is.

Re:OSS is evil.

[Archangel Michael]

I work in School District IT, and can assure you that teachers decide what is in the classrooms, not IT. If the Teachers want something, IT is charged with making it happen.

However, teachers aren't absolute in their dictations, as IT is able to make recommendations, and express concerns (support, helpdesk resposibility etc) .

Re:OSS is evil.

[morgan_greywolf]

What IT people? Maybe a University has an IT person, but most K-12 institutions in the U.S. have no dedicated IT person. Usually the "IT person" is just a teacher very knowledgeable about computers -- and is usually one of the teachers teaching computer programming classes. There's usually not a lot of formal IT policies, either. But I do know one thing -- the teacher, as a member of the faculty, is a representative of the school. If it was indeed a school-owned computer, the teacher has every right to order the student to run this or that or not run this or that on the school computer.

And the TFA is unclear about whether this was a student-owned computer or a school computer.

Re:OSS is evil.

[kdemetter]

If Firefox was installed on the school computers , then i see no reason not to use it .
Unless the teachers is completely blind , he can see the web page the student is looking at , and can judge from that wether or not he is doing his work .

This is like a teacher telling you to copy every file in a folder , and because he only knows how to do that by right click-copy-paste , you get detention for using Ctrl-A - Ctrl-C - Ctrl-V .

It's a silly example , but it's just the same .

Re:OSS is evil.

[elrous0]

Exactly, schools aren't there to teach creativity, they're supposed to teach conformity and acceptance. And I damn sure want to keep it that way because I'm creative, I like my job security, and I need schools to churn out people to fix my plumbing so I don't have to crawl around under my house. I would hope my fellow /.ers would feel the same.

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

Re:OSS is evil.

[arth1]

Indeed. It appears that the teacher here is the victim.
Even before seeing this statement from the school district, I believed this to be the case, due to most of the language being in correct English, apart from a few words and phrases with grammatical errors -- and those being the ones describing the teacher's assessment and actions.

If this being a fraud is indeed the case, I expect that the person who altered the detention letter gets expelled permanently, or, if not a student, charged with fraud and impersonation.

Re:OSS is evil.

[FireFury03]

If every kid comes out of school creative and motivated to do great things, where are we going to get people to do all the shit jobs that no one wants to do?

Prison?

No, we can't do that - it would be against the murderer's human rights to put him to work in a shitty job...

detention for disobedience

[yagu]

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:

• did this student have a history of infractions?
• was the student explaining his choice as a better browser as a canard?
• was the assignment specifically geared toward, or requiring of IE?
• was the firefox browser installed as an option and available, or,
• did the student download and install without authorization?

Re:detention for disobedience

[Anonymous Coward]

No surprise here, US schools have become so much about teaching to the test that kids are being taught not to think, but just blindly, mindlessly obey. No wonder there haven't been any sound leaders coming from the US this generation... because no one is learning how to think for themselves, think critically, and do what is right even when it conflicts with doing what you're told. Even Hollywood is in on it - try watching Dead Poet's Society sometime...

Re:detention for disobedience

[LWATCDR]

You really need to stop trying to be reasonable.
The Student was told twice to close Firefox and use IE.
He should have just fired up IE.

Re:detention for disobedience

[Hes Nikke]

this is slashdot, we don't use logic here. for that you need to go to.... um... not the internet!

Re:detention for disobedience

[Archangel Michael]

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 would love to require all teachers who want to use computers have to attend a class on computers in the classroom by someone like me who can explain the technology and what it can do (and not do) in the classroom.

However, I can equally assure you that the Teacher's Union is so high on itself that it wouldn't allow having a non-teacher teaching anything, let alone other teachers. There is this underlying current of elitism in many teachers.

Suffice it to say, I doubt that 85% of the teachers using computers in the classroom know anything more than "Click the Start Menu" type instruction, and if it isn't Microsoft ________ it isn't used. Period. Firefox isn't Microsoft, so it isn't used, and teachers don't know about it.

I don't know if I should blame the teachers or not. However, this teacher was running the classroom properly. The student had no right to change the instruction of the teacher (even if the student was correct). I know that managing a classroom of people is hard enough without having some rogue student thinking they know better. Even if Firefox is a better browser (it is), that doesn't give the student the right to vary from the instruction (use IE).

One last thing, the last thing I want on computers I manage is students downloading and installing whatever programs they think they want onto computers. If they want to use a program they need to request it through the proper channels. If I caught a student installing software on a computer without permission, I'd recommend they be expelled, regardless of what they were installing. Its not their computer.

Re:detention for disobedience

[ArcherB]

his is an apology for authoritarianism - assuming innocence on the part of authority, and granting benefits of doubt to their actions while also itemising possible hypothitical infractions by the accused.

Uh, no. I expect Authority to be... well, in charge. Imagine that. Should the students be allowed to install and run anything they want on school computers? Can you do that at YOUR job?

That is how fascism is apologised.

Blow it out your ass. Just because someone is in charge, in this case a teacher in charge of the classroom, doesn't mean that the school is fascist.

Re:detention for disobedience

[Sciros]

The teacher was under the impression that the student was not doing his work. So the request to 'close the program and resume work' was, well, nonsense. I'm not going to bother entertaining the idea of this being a 'reasonable' request, because the reasoning behind it was faulty to begin with. With this in mind, and with regards to your comment, should there be no issue taken up with teachers enforcing 'unreasonable' requests?

The whole 'punish first, investigate later' mentality of some teachers is the problem here. I have met many of the sort, and they are NOT among the better educators I know.

Your bullet list being what it is, I wonder whether you read the detention letter in the first place.

Re:detention for disobedience

[Archangel Michael]

And you sir, are an apologetic for anarchy - assuming the guilt on the part of the authority. The facts of the case are not in dispute, the student refused to do what the teacher said, which was a reasonable request. The students don't run the classroom, the teachers do (or are supposed to).

Re:detention for disobedience

[MarcoG42]

If I caught a student installing software on a computer without permission, I'd recommend they be expelled, regardless of what they were installing. If I caught you changing lanes without using your turn signal I'd recommend having your driving privileges revoked for life, regardless of the fact that the punishment doesn't fit the crime.

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:detention for disobedience

[plague3106]

I'm guessing you have a dislike of teachers, and probably authority in general and are bringing it in to an issue completely seperate from what you are talking about.

There is much reason to dislike authority, especially when authority is exercised when it shouldn't be, over trivial things. I'm more distrubed by people that blindly bow to authority of them than anyone who questions it. Its our duty as citizens of this nation to always question authority, and if we find said authority over-reaching, to ignore it or remove it.

Re:detention for disobedience

[syntaxeater]

Absolutely. In fact, I remember kids in my class getting in trouble quite often for using mechanical pencils to take scantrons. Seems dumb enough, but like many other people here have said - a lot of the facts were omitted for sensationalism. It could very well be that the school's criteria required IE.

Re:detention for disobedience

[Kevin Stevens]

I agree and just want to chime in.

Until I hear the whole story, including this kid's background, I would not pass judgment on the teacher or the school. This sounds eerily like the stories some kids used to tell along the lines of "I got detention just for sneezing!" which on the surface sounds like some idiot power-crazed teacher wronging a well meaning student. Then you get the back story, he was acting up in class, and being asked to control himself several times, then lets out an over-exaggerated (even if it was a naturally reflexive) sneeze intended to get more attention, which is the last straw to the teacher who then writes him up. But his version of the story is "all I did was sneeze, and I got detention!" which one or two of his buddies will corroborate, and that is what spreads around.

Somehow, it was always the disruptive students with histories of disruption that somehow ended up the victim of such events. I have a feeling this kid circumvented IT policies probably not for the first time, installed Firefox, showed off his 1337 skills to the class, who then caused a distraction by saying "ooh cool" followed up by "can you show me how to do that?!", the teacher then found out, and then said "close that and use IE" to which the student did not comply, probably at least twice, while basking in his badassness and attention from his classmates, then the fed-up teacher finally gave him detention.

Re:detention for disobedience

[WilliamX]

Uh, no. It doens't show that the kid can think for himself and solve his own problems. If he could do those things, he would have complied with the teachers command in situ and then later found time to talk to the teacher when it would not be disruptive to the classroom and made his case. Then the teacher would have more information on which to base their decision and could seek guidance from those in the school or district or can be trusted to provide advice to the teacher on these types of situations.

THAT would have been a great way of showing good problem solving skills. Disobeying during class, just because he didn't see a valid reason for the instruction, only shows that he has no respect for authority, and no sense of how to properly deal with problems and difficult situations.

Yes, I know this whole story is a hoax, but had it been real, the detention would have certainly been valid, and the kid would have hopefully learned a very very important lesson about how to handle those types of situations not only in the rest of his academic life, but in his "real" life as well.

Ah.

[Stanistani]

I think we can all safely jump to conclusions here and make some truly insane comments - GO!

Well, naturally

[timster]

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.

Some things never change

[ComaVN]

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)

at least not opera

[Soleen]

I wonder would he get an A from music teacher for using Oepra?

so what?

[abigsmurf]

He was told to use IE, didn't, teacher noticed, told him to use firefox, he mouthed off back to the teacher. Got punished. Nothing to see here.

Headline is a bit sensationalist.

Re:so what?

[PhxBlue]

Nothing to see here.

Except maybe why public schools are having such a hard time of it in the first place. A reasonable teacher might have said, "Interesting -- tell me more about it after class, but for now, stick with the other browser." This teacher, in contrast, played a power game and probably did more to undermine his authority in the classroom than reinforce it.

Re:so what?

[dougmc]

And you should always do what you're told, even if it sounds like, or is, not the best option? Baaaa, I will obey, baaaa. Well, that IS what high school is meant to be like. We don't let people think for themselves until at least college.

Student Given Detention For Disobedience

[ergo98]

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.

Student's Side.

[bigattichouse]

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.

Oh no, someone got detention for being an ass

[yotto]

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.

Am I the only one surprised...

[damn_registrars]

... 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).

Re:Am I the only one surprised...

[ThreeGigs]

Chances are the teacher was using some sort of process monitor to see what was running on the kids' computers.

Chances are also good that the teacher never saw the screen of the kid in question.

And, if the kid installed Firefox, he could have also uninstalled it, deleting all history. Any kid savvy enough to install Firefox is also probably savvy enough to have a good reason to avoid admin lockdowns in IE that prevent one from deleting your browsing history.

Worse? If the program running really *was* Foxfire.exe, not Firefox. I see no one has entertained the possibility that the kid was running malware. Also simple enough to rename utorrent.exe to foxfire.exe.

However, all of the above aside, aren't kids *supposed* to be supervised while on the net?

Essentially by running Firefox, the kid could've gotten around blocked sites, bypassed proxies, and been browsing pr0n with no accountability.

And as a sysadmin having dealt with too many users having installed things on work computers they shouldn't have (did the kid install the Google desktop with FF?), I'm completely on the teacher's side.

Disobedience

[Toonol]

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.)

What I hear:

[nahdude812]

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.

.exe

[yotto]

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.

Just more Slashdot sensationalism

[davmoo]

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.

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:Here's his teacher

[Macthorpe]

Anybody with half a brain will tell you that discipline is critical for kids when they're growing up, and here you are telling people to harrass a teacher who dared to punish a disobedient student.

Absolutely pathetic.

Re:authority figure is a moron

[MBCook]

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.

Re:authority figure is a moron

[plague3106]

Debating idiocity lends some validity to said idiocity.

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

it's in Illinois

[name_already_taken]

Where, pray tell, is this place known as "Idiocity"?

According to Google Maps it's at the Art Institute of Chicago

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

This has happened to me

[cowplex]

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.

a better response

[nomadic]

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."

Re:Here's his teacher

[macbigot]

"All I did was link to publicly available information. I didn't do anything further with it myself, what others did with it is up to them. If anyone really did abuse it (and I doubt that they did; any looneys would have looked up the info themselves) they will have to live with the consequences, not me." -VJ42

What you did (despite the lame attempt to cast aside responsibility) is to pretend that you aren't aware of 1) the large percentage of people that will skim across this forum and NOT realize that this teacher does not need thousands of hate-letters, 2) that many readers will not care that despite their mob-mentality -- their chastisement of the teacher would not have changed his/her behavior if he/she HAD done something wrong, and that 3) our legal system has fully vetted the "I didn't kill they guy I just left a bunch of guns around his little brother's room and what the kid does with them is his fault, not mine." -- and found it lacking in sound logic.

You are showing a method of rationalizing a witch trial that you believe in burning someone for, but can't support with your own logic -- so you hope others will anonymously carry out the sentence for you.

Shame on you. Whatever your political strip, civilized society does not value anarchy without reason. When there is a punishment without a crime, the punishment becomes the crime, and the leader of the torch-bearing mob the criminal.

You have branded yourself -- so don't get all upset that some readers here have pointed you out.