Monday Afternoon
The school tech came into my room and asked me to restart my computer for the work order I had put in. I told him that I hadn't put a work order in. He told me that he still needed me to restart my computer because of an update they did with the school's web filter. He left. I obediently restarted. Upon rebooting, I no longer had access to the filter override account. I couldn't access any blogs (including my own), any social bookmarking sites, Flickr, Google image search, twitter, and so on. I had previously been using these resources to improve the content I pushed toward my students in the classroom.
Tuesday Morning
I still was unable to bypass the filter. I sent an email to the school help desk and the school tech who visited me Monday afternoon explaining that I couldn't bypass the filter and that this was negatively impacting my ability to prepare quality content for my classes. The school tech emailed me back promptly explaining that he wasn't the person in charge of the filtration settings and to be sure that I filled out a help desk request (which I did).
Wednesday Morning
I still was unable to bypass the filter. I sent another email to the help desk and the school tech again explaining that I couldn't bypass the filter. This time I also included a list of several web sites that I was using from school to improve teaching and learning in my classroom that were now inaccessible. The school tech dropped by in person to explain that he personally couldn't do anything about it.
Wednesday Afternoon
I dropped by my local vice principal's office after school. I explained the situation to him, and he called down the school tech. The school tech again explained that he had no control over the school filtration setting, and that he asked his boss (the district head of technology) about it. Turns out that previously when one person used the filter override password, it shut down the filter for the entire district. As a result, they eliminated all override accounts. I asked about setting up a tiered filtration system- different filtration for staff than students. He said it's possible but it would take time and money, and since I was the only person who had a problem with the filter, it's not a priority. He suggested talking to my principal, who could talk to the superintendent, who could then tell him to set up tiered filtration. Did I mention we're between superintendents?
Seriously.
I have several major issues with this whole situation:
- As educators in the 21st Century, we need to be preparing students for the 21st Century. Draconian filtration protocols don't help this situation. I understand the need for filtration at school. I don't understand the degree to which it currently is enforced.
- The district has no educational technologist or whatever the title is. All tech personnel have no education experience. They're solely concerned with protecting their network. This is poor policy. Someone needs to stand up and fight for the educators using technology.
- I was told half-truths on Monday and Tuesday about what was happening. I asked why I needed to restart and then why the filter override wasn't working for me on Monday and Tuesday. My questions were not directly answered until today. I don't understand the reason for this.
What next?
I've emailed my principal and overseeing vice principal outlining my concerns with the filtration and explaining how it is negatively impacting my instructional practices. I'm extremely frustrated. I was never exactly happy with the level of filtering at the school, but because of the override I could get to enough resources that I wasn't going to raise much of a stink about it. Now I'm raising a stink- and now that I'm at it, I want students to have increased access as well.
Looking for help
If you have experience at a district with more lax filtration or tiered filtration at a school district, I'd love to hear from you- especially if you're in Connecticut. I was told by our district tech administrator he couldn't even unblock specific sites per teacher request- said the filtration system didn't work like that. That doesn't seem right to me. Is he right? Are filtration systems really that screwy?
Anyone have any success stories on pushing for more lax filtration?
You'd think this would be easier.
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Some related posts:
- Wes Fryer advocating for tiered filtration.
- Joe Wood on a good tech director
- Tony Wagner- Rigor Redifined (click on October 2008 to view the article)
Wow! What a start to the week.
It sounds like a bad dream and a real drag as one tries to teach students. It seems fishy to me but I am spoiled with a tiny school, one tech, one principal and a flexible filter provided statewide with the laptop initiative.
Good luck with getting this resolved in a timely fashion! Like Thursday!!! would be nice.
"If it's not the kids, it's the adults"
That's it, ask the students to solve this one! Problem Based Learning at it's finest.
Go around. You don't have time to fight any more insane bureaucracy than you already do. People will stand in your way, meaning well, and you have to decide if you want to tackle them head on and convince them (probably at the expense of your current students' opportunities to actually get at the content and also to have you focus your energy on them) or if you want to dodge the obstacle. Seems like a no-brainer to me. A google search for "gpass" will get you some software you can put on a USB stick and bring in. Feel free to delete this comment if you want plausible deniability -- I'll understand why, and won't be offended at all.
Try talking to the Curriculum Director and befriend the Superintendent and school board members. Show them what you are doing, how it positvely impacts students, and the successes you've had. Until then consider investing in a cell card or ask one of the neighboring homes with a wireless signal you can see for access. The whole situation really is pathetic and just a sign of the ill informed across the board decisions made by tech staff with no education background. Depending how filtering is set up the should be able to offer you a different level of access. I would guess the tech folks can access any site they wish. It might take money and time to make that happen, but if they don't want to offer that up maybe you don't want to work there. We're science teachers. We aren't a dime a dozen. The story you shared is very common and an example of why teachers like us must move into edtech leadership.
I was going to head to bed & respond to these comments tomorrow from school. Oh wait...can't do that now. Sorry...sour grapes there.
@nporter: I'm coming from a small school and I miss the ease with which the bureaucracy can be navigated. I've been told this school district is overly bureaucratic even for large districts.
@ben chun: I won't delete your comment. I'm open for "creative" circumnavigation techniques- though I do feel that it's important to work for change in our schools. However, I agree that it's very important to not inadvertently punish the students with poor teaching because I'm focused so heavily on fighting for changing district policies. Your idea might be a stopgap to fill the time between now and whenever policies become more tech friendly.
@joe: I'm definitely emphasizing the ways in which the blocked content can be used to improve classroom instruction. Unfortunately it gets harder to prove its effectiveness when it can't be accessed. I can also hear the inevitable question, "Show how this will improve CAPT (our NCLB standardized test) scores." I'm not sure I can prove that to the level it'll require.
Luckily, I'm on the School Improvement Team's technology committee and our first meeting is tomorrow. Any ideas on what issues I'll be bringing up? 😉
There are examples of districts that do not filter - here's one. http://www.etsb.qc.ca/en/EnhancedLearningStrategy/default.shtm
I'm anticipating that you will win this one (or go elsewhere). My suggestion is that once you get these resources back in your classroom, part of the mission be publicizing exceptional student work and showcasing students in board meetings, etc. It's a lot easier to get the superintendent to notice it if you can say, "remember those kids who were at the school board meeting showing their online projects? Well, this decision stopped that project. Fix it."
Maybe bring a student to your SIT meeting and have them explain what's been lost?
@Sylvia Martinez: Thanks for the suggestions. Part of the major issue I'm facing is that students have never had access to these online tools, thus there's nothing to showcase. The best I can do is show some examples of exceptional student work from my last school, and hope that's enough.
I'm trying hard to keep the focus on the students in my arguments. It's easy to say that it makes my life more difficult, but I doubt that's not as convincing as saying it makes the students' learning experiences poorer.
[...] trying to convince my district to lax their filtration policies. Currently all blogs, social media sites, image hosting or searching sites, and many other online [...]
Sylvia's suggestions are great. We've just started down the filtering road, and fortunately, our administration supports most educational access (basically g a m b l i n g, p o r n o graphy and social networking is blocked for students), and our faculty access is more open. We have a 24-hour response to unblock requests, and it seems to be working.
That being said, sometimes you just don't want to wait 24 hours when you're at that "teachable moment" in class.
Of course, if all else fails, there are a variety of "proxy" sites that will allow you to bypass filters. Students know about these and use them all the time. A Google search of "proxy sites" may help.
@Charlene: Thanks for the info. The more districts I can potentially point our administrators to that don't filter to the maximum extent the better.
I'm not against trying out proxy servers (although interestingly enough, the proxy our students like best is actually blocked on my machine. Weird). However, I strongly believe that I shouldn't have to.
[...] of the (relative) blue, @nporter threw a link at me as a result of my recent post on filter troubles. The link turned out to be a gem of an article on Edutopia written by Suzie [...]
[...] knowledgeable enough on the topic to make the best decisions for our students. Excessive filtering of internet content and the banning of cell phones are two indicators of that [...]
[...] is to lock out some of the most relevant teaching and learning opportunities for our students (as I’ve mentioned before). As educators we need to have an open dialogue with our students about these technologies- [...]