I have three to four students per year (that's about 2% of my students) try to friend me. They are all turned down. Parents are usually notified too, because it makes me feel a little creepy (incidentally, I'm male, and all the requests have been from males; I think the girls are better at knowing it's creepy). It used to just be my policy, now it's the administration's policy. The teachers are almost universally a fan of this policy.
Some teachers started course accounts on Facebook, separate from their personal accounts. What would be much better is to deploy technology with similar functionality on school networks, so that the school has control and supervision of the content.
The kids can contact me through two separate legitimate channels (regular email and our web grading system), both of which I check more frequently than my Facebook account, with questions about grades, homework, course material, etc. These channels are monitored for everyone's protection.
I agree with other posters though - most teachers already are not doing this, and school boards are making it policy already. The legislature probably wanted to make sure everybody was covered, and I can understand where they're coming from.
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I have three to four students per year (that's about 2% of my students) try to friend me. They are all turned down. Parents are usually notified too, because it makes me feel a little creepy (incidentally, I'm male, and all the requests have been from males; I think the girls are better at knowing it's creepy). It used to just be my policy, now it's the administration's policy. The teachers are almost universally a fan of this policy. Some teachers started course accounts on Facebook, separate from their personal accounts. What would be much better is to deploy technology with similar functionality on school networks, so that the school has control and supervision of the content. The kids can contact me through two separate legitimate channels (regular email and our web grading system), both of which I check more frequently than my Facebook account, with questions about grades, homework, course material, etc. These channels are monitored for everyone's protection. I agree with other posters though - most teachers already are not doing this, and school boards are making it policy already. The legislature probably wanted to make sure everybody was covered, and I can understand where they're coming from.