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> Yes, but normally we punish people for intent and actual harm not for potential. And this is the key to our disagreement. As a practicing teacher, for me, un

by ux-app 12y ago

> Yes, but normally we punish people for intent and actual harm not for potential. And this is the key to our disagreement. As a practicing teacher, for me, unauthorised access of my computer by a student is not a harmless prank. It is a serious action in its own right requiring serious consequences. It would not be characterised by any teacher that is sound of mind as a "harmless prank" The subsequent actions are immaterial. The access itself is already a serious issue. As teachers part of what we do is to build communities of ethical participants. I should be able to momentarily leave my desk unattended without fear of a malicious student defacing my desktop with a pornographic image. Let me make this very clear - it is the access itself that already makes this a serious issue, regardless of any potential harm that may or may not have been done in the process! Of course as I have already stated many times: 1. Involving the police is an overreaction. 2. Treating it as a harmless prank is an underreaction 3. A reasonable middle ground should have been pursued by the school > If you're a high school teacher you're going to have to have a ticker skin than that to let such stuff bother you. This has nothing do do with having a thick skin. > your 'reputation' is not going to be damaged one way or another by you putting up a picture on an overhead projector placed there by another person. You are conflating personal reputation with professional reputation. Your professional reputation absolutely can be harmed, even by completely unsubstantiated accusations. This is true of all workplaces, not just schools. > But your reputation will be determined by how you respond to it. According to normal school policy this teacher acted exactly as they should by reporting this serious issue. By doing so they have preserved their professional reputation. Not reporting the issue would have been a breach of their contractual and ethical obligations. > That computer came pretty close to not having access control either. Using the lastname of the teacher as a password does not count as 'access control' imo This is a tangential issue. Yes the school should have had better password policies in place. "your password was insecure" is not a valid defense in respect to unauthorised computer use. If an adult tried the same in court they would be laughed out. And yes, this was not an adult, but as teachers part of our job is to educate our students about the real world. If we treat this issue as a "harmless prank" in school and then the young adult enters the real world after leaving school they will be surprised when a judge doesn't buy their classic "Harmless Prank" defense! > It should be fairly obvious that the teacher did not put the image there to all present, that's the whole point of a prank. After all, it was found out who did it, wasn't it? That's not how things work in the real world. If a teacher is found to have any inappropriate material tied to their school account an investigation would (and rightly so) be conducted. I'm speaking from experience here. Schools take this kind of thing very seriously. This is why we as teachers also take this kind of action very seriously. There is no such think as "haha just kidding buddy!! :)" in a school setting. > The teachers career was not in any danger so you're still responding to what might have been, not what actually was. This is naive. The intent of the student was clearly malicious. The teacher was lucky and dodged a bullet. You have no idea how quickly bad news travels in a high school. If even one or two students happened to catch sight of the image on the teacher's screen it would be the number one talking point across the school within hours. This would lead to an official administrative investigation within less than 24 hours! If the teacher didn't immediately report the issue it would without a doubt be viewed as the teacher having something to hide. This kind of issue can very quickly escalate in a school setting.

jacquesm 12y ago
I think you're under-estimating the effects of the fall-out of all this on both the reputation of the teacher and of the school. Bad judgement all around. Sure the pupil was in the wrong but we're discussing this across timezones now, which means it has gone way beyond where it should have gone and you really can not blame the student for that. That you're more sensitive to this issue because you are a teacher is obvious (fwiw my brother was a high school History teacher and from the fact that that's in the past tense you can take it as read that I understand some of the pressure), that should not get you distracted too much about what happened here. "malicious" is a very stretchable word, I've lived in the 'real world' long enough now that I think that I can recognize an over-reaction when I see one (and your comments are also over-reacting). The fact that teachers in the past have over-stepped their conduct should not result in those measures having effects on the future lives of students in their care, that's just more fall-out. If you're concerned about access to your computer then protect it properly and refuse to work with a school that mandates insecure setups. Having an insecure machine isn't a valid defence against being hacked either, in that 'real world' that you go on about you have an obligation to secure your property just as much as the other party has an obligation not to attempt to breach that security. Where this all failed is where it began: education, if educators are not able to create an atmosphere where there is room for some give-and-take and where harmless pranks can ruin lives then we've all lost. The reason why we use separate rules for minors and adults is that they are minors! Keep in mind you're dealing with kids here and don't ruthlessly apply the standards and rulesets for adults to kids. Half the time they don't oversee the consequences of their actions. > You have no idea how quickly bad news travels in a high school. If even one or two students happened to catch sight of the image on the teacher's screen it would be the number one talking point across the school within hours. This would lead to an official administrative investigation within less than 24 hours! If the teacher didn't immediately report the issue it would without a doubt be viewed as the teacher having something to hide. This kind of issue can very quickly escalate in a school setting. If that's the atmosphere you're working in then you have already lost before you started.
- ux-app 12y ago
  > and your comments are also over-reacting In what sense? I have all along stated that involving the police is a gross overreaction. Treating unauthorized access of a teacher's computer as a "harmless prank" is a monumental underreaction. I've already clearly spelled out the multitude of ways in which a teacher's professional career can be utterly destroyed by a malicious actor. The potential for devastating consequences for the teacher are not hypothetical! > If you're concerned about access to your computer then protect it properly and refuse to work with a school that mandates insecure setups. As I've said all along the actual password polices were stupid and incompetent, but they are a fundamentally tangential issue. > if educators are not able to create an atmosphere where there is room for some give-and-take and where harmless pranks can ruin lives then we've all lost. Unauthorized access of a teacher's computer is NOT a harmless prank. The potential for catastrophic downside for the teacher involved is NOT hypothetical. If a malicious student were able to in some way, over an extended time imitate a teacher accessing child porn then a long term prison sentence is certainly not out of the question (this applies to anyone, however being a teacher would be a highly aggravating circumstance!). This is why the access itself is a serious issue. Of course a better password policy is a great starting point. Treating this issue as a "harmless prank" would be grossly incompetent by the school. In the adult world there are many cases of people going to prison for exactly this! Should we treat this kind of issue as a "harmless prank" in school? What kind of distorted picture of reality would we be giving students if we did this? In my opinion there should have been a proportionate, but serious school-based consequence. > The reason why we use separate rules for minors and adults is that they are minors! Keep in mind you're dealing with kids here and don't ruthlessly apply the standards and rulesets for adults to kids. Half the time they don't oversee the consequences of their actions. As I've stated many times, I disagree with the felony escalation. I also completely disagree with your "haha it's just a prank guys! why so serious???!!" response. > If that's the atmosphere you're working in then you have already lost before you started. You yourself stated that the reason for such stringent oversight is a history of wrong doing by teachers. We work with minors, and therefore the conditions of our employment are far more stringent that a normal workplace.

by ux-app 12y ago

jacquesm 12y ago

I think you're under-estimating the effects of the fall-out of all this on both the reputation of the teacher and of the school. Bad judgement all around. Sure the pupil was in the wrong but we're discussing this across timezones now, which means it has gone way beyond where it should have gone and you really can not blame the student for that. That you're more sensitive to this issue because you are a teacher is obvious (fwiw my brother was a high school History teacher and from the fact that that's in the past tense you can take it as read that I understand some of the pressure), that should not get you distracted too much about what happened here. "malicious" is a very stretchable word, I've lived in the 'real world' long enough now that I think that I can recognize an over-reaction when I see one (and your comments are also over-reacting). The fact that teachers in the past have over-stepped their conduct should not result in those measures having effects on the future lives of students in their care, that's just more fall-out. If you're concerned about access to your computer then protect it properly and refuse to work with a school that mandates insecure setups. Having an insecure machine isn't a valid defence against being hacked either, in that 'real world' that you go on about you have an obligation to secure your property just as much as the other party has an obligation not to attempt to breach that security. Where this all failed is where it began: education, if educators are not able to create an atmosphere where there is room for some give-and-take and where harmless pranks can ruin lives then we've all lost. The reason why we use separate rules for minors and adults is that they are minors! Keep in mind you're dealing with kids here and don't ruthlessly apply the standards and rulesets for adults to kids. Half the time they don't oversee the consequences of their actions. > You have no idea how quickly bad news travels in a high school. If even one or two students happened to catch sight of the image on the teacher's screen it would be the number one talking point across the school within hours. This would lead to an official administrative investigation within less than 24 hours! If the teacher didn't immediately report the issue it would without a doubt be viewed as the teacher having something to hide. This kind of issue can very quickly escalate in a school setting. If that's the atmosphere you're working in then you have already lost before you started.

ux-app 12y ago
> and your comments are also over-reacting In what sense? I have all along stated that involving the police is a gross overreaction. Treating unauthorized access of a teacher's computer as a "harmless prank" is a monumental underreaction. I've already clearly spelled out the multitude of ways in which a teacher's professional career can be utterly destroyed by a malicious actor. The potential for devastating consequences for the teacher are not hypothetical! > If you're concerned about access to your computer then protect it properly and refuse to work with a school that mandates insecure setups. As I've said all along the actual password polices were stupid and incompetent, but they are a fundamentally tangential issue. > if educators are not able to create an atmosphere where there is room for some give-and-take and where harmless pranks can ruin lives then we've all lost. Unauthorized access of a teacher's computer is NOT a harmless prank. The potential for catastrophic downside for the teacher involved is NOT hypothetical. If a malicious student were able to in some way, over an extended time imitate a teacher accessing child porn then a long term prison sentence is certainly not out of the question (this applies to anyone, however being a teacher would be a highly aggravating circumstance!). This is why the access itself is a serious issue. Of course a better password policy is a great starting point. Treating this issue as a "harmless prank" would be grossly incompetent by the school. In the adult world there are many cases of people going to prison for exactly this! Should we treat this kind of issue as a "harmless prank" in school? What kind of distorted picture of reality would we be giving students if we did this? In my opinion there should have been a proportionate, but serious school-based consequence. > The reason why we use separate rules for minors and adults is that they are minors! Keep in mind you're dealing with kids here and don't ruthlessly apply the standards and rulesets for adults to kids. Half the time they don't oversee the consequences of their actions. As I've stated many times, I disagree with the felony escalation. I also completely disagree with your "haha it's just a prank guys! why so serious???!!" response. > If that's the atmosphere you're working in then you have already lost before you started. You yourself stated that the reason for such stringent oversight is a history of wrong doing by teachers. We work with minors, and therefore the conditions of our employment are far more stringent that a normal workplace.