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Injunction Blocks "Don't Be Friends" Law For Missouri Teachers
Mr.Intel writes "A Missouri Circuit Court granted an injunction today, blocking the state law (PDF) that would ban all electronic communication between teachers and students, including their own children that was set to take effect on Sunday."
They took an oath "I do solemnly swear, or affirm, that I will support the Constitution of the United States ...". Voting for a law that clearly violates the Constitution means they violated their oath of office.
I believe this is what you are looking for... (warning: PDF) http://www.msta.org/files/resources/publications/injunction.pdf
The jurisdiction that I'm licensed in didn't make electronic communications with students illegal, but the teacher licensing body did create a set of guidelines. Even though I don't entirely agree with those guidelines, they don't: force the disclosure of a teacher's electronic communications; dictate what types of services a teacher can or cannot use; or create absurd situations, such as the children of a teacher scenario. The worse that can happen for violating those standards is the loss of your teaching license, so you can still have a life outside of teaching if something does go wrong. (Assuming that you didn't go anything criminal.)
I would also like to see some education on the parental front. I would much rather a parent monitoring my communications with a child than my employer. After all, it is the parent who is ultimately responsible for the upbringing of the child and it is the parent who should be deciding the boundaries that other adults have with their children.
I really do not see a serious problem with that.
Being a "friend" is not inherently a bad thing.
Maybe not but as a high school student I saw plenty of examples of questionable relationships between students and teachers.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
It says they can't use sites *which allow* exclusive access to students, not that they can't use sites *for* exclusive access to students. So if the site allows private messages they can't even use the site for public messages.
Indeed. Quote from section 162.069:
Teachers also cannot have a nonwork-related website that allows exclusive access with a current or former student.
Honestly from the wording, it sounds like they can't use any social networking at all, even if they don't even have any students friended... as long as the potential to talk to a student privately is there.
They took an oath "I do solemnly swear, or affirm, that I will support the Constitution of the United States ...". Voting for a law that clearly violates the Constitution means they violated their oath of office.
And this is different than all the other countless times a law has been struck down... how?
The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
The slashdot summary is totally inaccurate. The law wouldn't "ban all electronic communication between teachers and students." This post explains what it would actually do. Basically they wanted to make sure parents have access to all electronic communication between teachers and students.
Find free books.
The out for that is that you'd have to show that they were quite certain the law violated the constitution before signing it. They can always play the "I'm a moron" card, who wouldn't believe that?
The facebook "friend" covers a large gamut of relationships. It can be entirely impersonal such as liking a band or a product or it can be more personal than real-world friends such as married people. I would hope the student-teacher friend status would be along the lines of mentor (which is certainly not at all an abuse!). If it isn't, then electronic communication isn't the problem and blocking electronic communication certainly won't fix it.
The many states being allowed to have varying laws is actually shown to be effective here. Missouri tried something new and failed. The rest of the country can choose to take what happened here into their own decision making process. One state now suffers the consequences of passing a law like this, instead of the entire population.
Saying you're that stupid you didn't recognize a law would be a violation of the Constitution should then be construed as the rep is incompetent for their job -- and should still resign.
This is because teachers are in a 'position of trust.'
Then how about trusting teachers not to abuse your kid :)
At the end of the day, you can legislate everything a teacher must/can say, but is that good?
It surely prevents teachers from doing anything out of the ordinary, and in that case why not just replace him with a video tape...
Bottom line: Trust that your teachers are competent and manage a healthy relationship with their students.
If I remember correctly, teachers in my public school told us that we could always come to them if we had personal problems. Surely, they could abuse any such situation. However, I find it far more likely teachers might actually help the kid, get over the grief of loosing grandparents, stop others bulling or discover that the kid is being neglected at home.
Thank you, I needed a good laugh.
The wast majority, Of child abuse cases, Involves one or both of the childs parents. If you add the rest of the immediate family, Almost all cases of child abuse, Is accounted for.
If you are afraid that a teacher will abuse you children, Then stop sending your children to Sunday "school".
"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest." - Denis Diderot.
I often think that people who advocate states rights aren't paying any attention to the actual state governments they want to give more power to...
It also violates the Missouri Constitution it seems and giving the states more power doesn't mean they could go against the U.S. Constitution. Homogenizing the states by making the Federal government more powerful hasn't really made anyone happy on the left, right or middle. Throughout history the choice of states has helped America through tough times. Populations moved around as an economic collapse in one area would lead people to other areas. Let some states be more liberal and let some be more conservative while protecting civil rights/liberty. People for the most part should be governed locally. The seesaw between the two sides at the Federal level have led to massive spending by both sides and a lowest common denominator approach to politics.
I'm unsure what the answer to all of our problems are but I tend to think people will always disagree about some things. We just don't need to turn every disagreement into action by the Federal government. So far in this particular instance, Missouri seems to be handling it completely on their own.
If half the country likes law A and dislikes law B and the other half likes law B and dislikes A there are two choices (in the context of federal vs state). At a federal level you get one law you like and one you don't. At a state level you get 25 states to choose from. I'd rather have the opportunity to move than be governed by laws I disagree with half the time.
Actually, looking at that with a bit broader perspective..
it sounds like teachers not only cannot use any social networking, but also cannot use non-school-provided email, cannot use slashdot, and cannot play any sort of online game that has any sort of chat or messaging function.
Kinda ridiculous. Just a tad. Teachers have enough shit to put up with that forces them to keep up appearances of an absolutely puritanical robotic life. Oh gosh, Timmy's dad saw you buying a case of beer at the store, YOU'RE IN FOR IT NOW! He'll go and complain to the school board about what a poor example you're setting for the children!.. yeah.
Depression! Fun for the whole fucking family!
... still waiting for this free-as-in-beer free beer I keep hearing about.
Does it actually state that anywhere? Because that has to be the most ridiculous part of the law.
Reading the injunction (here) it seems the original law does indeed prohibit parent/child association, and the court agrees with you that it is ridiculous. On page 2:
[the law states] "No teacher shall establish, maintain, or use a non-work-related internet site which allows exclusive access with a current or or former student."
...
... Even if a complete ban on certain forms of communication between certain individuals could be construed as content neutral and only a reasonable restriction on "time, place and manner," the breadth of the prohibition is staggering. The Court finds at based upon the evidence adduced at the preliminary injunction hearing, social networking is extensively used by educators. It is often primary, if not sole manner, of communications between the Plaintiffs and their students. Examination of the statute indicates that it would prohibit all teachers from using any non-work-related social networking sites which allow exclusive access with current and former students. It clearly prohibits communication between family members and their teacher parents using these types of sites. The Court finds that the statute would have a chilling effect on speech.
So yeah, redonkulous.
Does it actually state that anywhere? Because that has to be the most ridiculous part of the law.
No it doesn't. It merely fails to make any kind of exemption for that situation.
Honestly, having read the bill, I found it to be mostly reasonable, but needs a few tweaks here and there. Most of the people who are all up in arms about it are basing their opinion of it on what bloggers have said about it, which is mostly inaccurate.
"You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war." -- Albert Einstein
No, voting for this doesn't mean that they are stupid. Hypocrisy is a more likely explanation than stupidity.
Here's how it works: Some parent gets offended because their kid did something that the parent didn't know about. Maybe the parents are jerks, maybe there's a real problem, but you can be sure that one or more parent was offended.
The parent makes a fuss, and a TV station gets involved. TV stations and newspapers love controversy, so they blow the story up into a huge sensation. The public loves to get self-righteous.
Something must be done. Cue the politicians. They come up with something. It doesn't matter if the law is good or bad, what matters is that Politicians A, B, and C are in the paper and on TV doing something about the outrage of the month. Let the judge take the heat from idiot parents, the politicians tried to Protect Our Children.
Will the TV station explain what's wrong with the law? No, that's bad for ratings. Facts are boring. Emotion is good for ratings. See talk radio for more examples. Hell, see Slashdot headlines and summaries.
The politician will lose maybe three votes from people who understand the Constitution. If he votes against the law, he loses hundreds or thousands of votes.
There are people who view holding office as public service, and they try to write good laws. But most voters and most media personalities don't care. Prayer in School! Abortion! Guns! Drugs! Gay Marriage! Immigrants! Why tackle hard issues that TV will ignore when you can invoke rage about high-emotion issues?
except if this law passed it would come into effect after many people decided to be a teacher.
and also what if there were a law that stripped the constitutional rights of anyone who attended protests against the government. i mean they choose to attend the protest right?
i spent five minutes thinking and all i got was this crappy sig
The problem with these so-called recourses is they don't provide sufficient deterrent to legislators. They can pass unconstitutional law after unconstitutional law; those which are unchallenged or survive the courts stand, those which do not end up being passed again with slightly different wording until they do survive the courts. As long as there's no actual punishment for legislators (and I don't mean something as blunt and as uncertain as an election), they'll keep doing it.
I don't know where exactly we all went wrong. I know WHY such a law was enacted, but how did we get this far? Student and teacher have an inappropriate relationship. Ok, fine. It happens. It doesn't happen very often, but it does happen, and it has likely happened since there were teachers and students. Somewhere along the line, the issue of what is appropriate (and legal) eventually made its way into policy and legislation, and we were all content to understand that everyone knew the rules and occasionally we would have to slap down someone who violated it. For those of you who are 30 or older, think back to your school years. You've probably heard a rumor or two, or if it got really bad, maybe read about it in the newspaper, where some local teacher and a student had an inappropriate relationship. It was scandalous to be sure, but it was rare enough to be considered an oddity. Something that doesn't happen often enough to get really excited about. Just take care of it when it DOES happen and let everyone's lives continue as normal. It's likely that the percentages haven't really changed. What HAS changed though is the fact that with the internet making sure that every local story is potentially nationwide news, we now get to hear about EVERY SINGLE CASE. And if by some chance the national media overlooks one, someone on digg or fark will be sure to publicize it, with a snarky, memorable headline, so we don't miss out on any. This makes what is actually a very rare event seem like it's happening every day, all around us. It makes it seem so rampant that surely EVERY teacher is pondering the possibilities. So enough concerned parents get just loud enough for the politicians to pay attention, and the message is that we want to preemptively prevent this from happening.
The problem with politicians is they tend to be reactionary. When some kid shows up to school armed to the teeth and kills 15 classmates, those politicians BETTER DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. Some new law better be passed that will prevent this thing from ever happening again. The problem is, the easiest, cleanest, and least debatable solution would usually revolve around some controversial issue, like outlawing all guns. Fortunately, there is enough resistance to make sure THAT doesn't quite happen. But consider teachers and social media, and how it relates with the bottomless pit of scandal that revolves around protecting our children at all costs. I'm sure, especially in the last few years, that a lot of the inappropriate teacher/student relationships had some element of social media involvement. That's a simple but potent fact that people and politicians can latch onto. Cut THAT particular cord, and maybe the relationships will
never materialize in the first place. The problem is, it seems too weak to just make it a general policy to avoid unnecessary off-campus communication with current students. That's not really a law... people can't really BREAK that law, and therefore we can't punish anyone who does. So they come up with something that's absolute, thorough (so nobody finds a loophole), and concise, so people can actually read all of it in one sitting. By the time you're done drafting such a
law, you end up with a much larger problem than the one you were trying to solve in the first place.
Chris Hansen must be proud of what he has achieved.
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
Again, like others have said many times, this law only applied to children under 18 so it doesn't violate any amendments since you do not have the right to speak to other people's children.
the world existed before Facebook and texting and somehow we went through school just fine. The law is just trying to protect students from creepy teachers AND protect teachers from false accusations or accidentally getting in trouble ("Susie, why is your teacher mr Rodgers messaging you on Facebook?"). This law sounded good for everyone and its sensational journalism like "law stopping teachers from talking To Their Own Children (!!) has been rejected" that is ruining it.
Can someone explain why it's necessary for teachers and students to be Facebook friends? How exactly is it going to hurt education if they're not friends? Also the law does not prevent electronic communication, it only forbids it outside the watchful eye of school admin and parents. If the school setup their own social networking app that gave school admin and parents the right to see everything that would be fine.
I'm a bit surprised Facebook hasn't chimed in saying they'll add a feature allowing parents and school admin the ability to see student and teacher communications. That would solve this whole mess. Actually Facebook should probably add a few parental controls to accounts of those under 18 anyway.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
Again, like others have said many times, this law only applied to children under 18 so it doesn't violate any amendments since you do not have the right to speak to other people's children.
Where in the First Amendment is there an exception based on age?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Um, the first amendment is directed explicitly at legislatures, NOT a parent with their child. The child is not GRANTED rights in the Bill of Rights; simply given protections that Congress (and state legislatures) will not violate assumed rights.
There is nothing in the BoR or Constitution that says that a store-owner may not impose a "no talking" restriction on its patrons, or that you may not control who may talk to your daughter.
Its a common misconception that the 1st amendment means "you can say what you want". It only says "neither congress (nor state legislatures) may prevent you from saying what you want"; the two are very different. In this case, a state legislature WAS attempting to control who could say what, and on "former students" after they had become "of age" to boot. This is the parent's responsibility, and the state has no authority to do such a thing.
Sorry for double post-- even minors have all the protections in the first amendment; there have been court battles over it and the one exception I am aware of (other than "imminent danger") is that children WHILE THEY ARE AT SCHOOL are assumed to be under the "parental supervision" of the school-- the teachers receive some degree of the authority that the parent has, including the right to ask students to be silent.
However, I do not believe the courts have EVER allowed a law that silences "free speech" of students extracurricularly.
You obviously don't have grandchildren, or nephews, etc.
Actually, that you think this is creepy, is itself, in my eyes, creepy. You actually believe that 17-year olds should only be able to speak with their parents, each other, or other adults for whom some lawmaker has been gracious enough to create an exception?
Or did you just not think about it before opening your keyboard?
...are assumed to be under the "parental supervision" of the school-- the teachers receive some degree of the authority that the parent has, including the right to ask students to be silent.
Yes, it's called in loco parentis . The linked article goes into some detail about what that actually means.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Sometimes that abuse will have extraordinarily negative consequences, such as a teacher using their position to gain access to children then physically, emotionally, or sexually abusing them.
Sure, and for every case of abuse that occurs, should millions of otherwise perfectly normal, healthy, nurturing relationships be artificially severed? That attitude is morally questionable, akin to the "no matter the cost, if it saves but one life, it's worth it" attitude that is so prevalent among our psychotically risk-averse society.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.