"Privacy is dead and social media holds the smoking gun." -Pete Cashmore

In recent years, there have been many debates about whether or not social media is a useful tool. Those who are more positive about Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok claim that it's a wonderful ways to keep in contact with friends and manage their businesses. However, those who aren't as taken by social media and its practices claim that it's distracting and the cause of many issues in today's society.

Debates about social media have entered all domains of life and teachers are heavily involved in determining whether or not students should be using social networking platforms while at school. Also, it's worth stating that at certain education centres around the world, educators have been discussing the rights and wrongs of parents and teachers snooping on their children online.

While it may shock some of our readers, recently a high school in California decided to spend over USD 40,000 hiring a private firm to police students’ social media accounts. Since this incident, there has been a debate raging worldwide regarding both the ethics and usefulness of supervising the actions of students on social networking sites.

Just when we thought that George Orwell's Big Brother was a fictional character! 

Therefore, without further ado, in today's article, we'll review the controversial topic of surveying social media accounts in the school setting.

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How Can Teachers Address Social Media Safety with Students?

social media safety
Since practically all students have phones and social media accounts, teachers must address using social networking platforms safely. (Source: Unsplash)

Though it's the primary responsibility of parents to instruct and discipline their children, teachers have a major impact on kids and teenagers throughout primary and secondary school. Therefore, academic advisors and teachers can provide helpful tips and suggestions about social media safety. But, why is that important? There's an increasing need to help students stay safe on social media for the following reasons:

  • Social media has been proven to increase the risk of depression, self-harm, and anxiety,
  • Excessive exposure to social networking sites may promote negative feelings about one's life in comparison to others, 
  • Cyberbullying is extremely common on social media and this can destroy the self-esteem of kids and teens, 
  • Social media accounts can be hacked and false information can easily be spread about a person.

Truthfully, the previously mentioned reasons are harrowing and can cause serious mental and emotional health problems that are carried into adulthood. So, how can educators encourage their students to use social networking sites safely? Let's consider the list below:

  • Remind Students That Everything Online is Permanent: posts uploaded on the internet aren't written in pencil but rather in pen. What's that supposed to mean? Well, everything posted, even to close friends or deleted photos, stays forever. Someone might've captured a screenshot or saved an image. The same goes with comments; everything stays.
  • Practice Social Media Etiquette: it's disgusting how people treat each other in the comments section of YouTube, Twitter, or Instagram. It seems that every negative thought is expressed just to destroy the sentiments of others and make them feel small. So, since it's the responsibility of teachers to try their best to build socially conscious individuals, a review of social media etiquette with students would be a brilliant idea. For instance, have students meditate on these facts before they publish something that could cause them to hurt others or affect their good reputation. Pupils can ask themselves, is this post really necessary? Will I negatively affect others with my comments?
  • Keep a Strong Password: another way to stay safe when using social media is by having a strong password that is reliable and that isn't used on any other account. Weak passwords are the most common cybersecurity breaches and this causes sensitive information sent via direct message to become public. Students could be devastated if their private information becomes public. Therefore, encourage your pupils to have passwords that are no less than eight characters long contain a variety of numbers, letters, and special characters, and that avoid the use of names, birthdays, and other common information, and change your passwords every few months.

Honestly, social media websites are just greedy for more users and they don't care about the well-being of people. So, it's refreshing when teachers and parents take an active interest to prevent the next generation from harming or being harmed online.

What are the Pros and Cons of Supervising Social Media Accounts?

kids at school
Teachers and parents are more eager to survey the accounts of social media for students who are very young to prevent them from harmful dangers. (Source: Unsplash)

Maibecausethat online bullying has reached an all-time high because of the various social media sites and technological devices used by children, the right to privacy over protection is worthy of being analysed.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and many other trustworthy individuals, believe that privacy is one of the pillars of society.

But, which side of the issue are you on? It's important to mention that the issue of supervising social media accounts is wrought with contradictory views. Therefore, to set matters straight and to help you come up with a viewpoint that you feel comfortable with, we'll consider the benefits and drawbacks of supervising social media accounts. 

Pros

Like everything in life, there are many benefits of surveying the social media accounts of underage students while they are at school. The list below features three bulletproof reasons:

  • Most schools place a strong emphasis on combatting face-to-face bullying. However, cyberbullying is much more difficult to control and this needs to be addressed NOW because, in schools around the world, too many teens are losing their lives to suicide caused by this issue and if parents lack the knowledge to adequately control their children’s input on social media, schools should step in to stop tragedies from occurring.
  • Children who are being bullied can often feel embarrassed to report the issue to parents or teachers since they often internalise feelings of guilt or shame. By keeping an eye out for who is being bullied online, schools can speak out for children who are too afraid to do so. It's been reported that a third group of bullied kids/teens fail to inform their parents or teachers because they think they won't respond effectively. In the US, a poll of nearly 12,000 students revealed that only one-third of students seriously affected by bullying felt that telling an adult about the situation would make things better.
  • Many parents don’t know enough about social media and its controls and filters, to effectively monitor their children’s use of the most popular social networks. Moreover, kids aren’t just using popular social media sites like Facebook or Twitter; they are also active on more obscure sites like Snapchat, which are less known by parents and therefore less likely to be supervised.

All in all, the three previously mentioned reasons are extremely valid points for having teachers take an active interest in monitoring the social media activity of the students they are teaching. Now, what about the disadvantages of monitoring social media accounts?

protecting influencable minds
There are many advantages to social media such as communicating with friends living abroad and promoting your business. (Source: Unsplash)

Cons

If you ask the other half on the side of the social media surveying issue, you will get negative viewpoints that include the following:

  • The main responsibility for controlling social media use belongs to parents, not schools.
  • Allowing schools to police students opens the floodgates to various legal conundrums. For instance, if a school finds sensitive information about a student, do they have an obligation to disclose it? If they decide not to, should they be held responsible if negative consequences ensue from their decision to abstain from becoming involved?
  • Schools should worry less about policing and more about prevention. It's a better idea for teachers to work hard to foster no-tolerance policies for bullies and encourage immediate reporting by students. More emphasis should also be placed on teaching e-safety at school so that kids know how to use privacy settings and do not fall into the trap of posting sensitive information about themselves on social media sites.
  • The emphasis should be taken away from policing and placed on awareness. Parents and teachers should learn how to react when a child tells them they are being bullied. If children thought adults could help them, they would not be so hesitant about opening up.

There we have it, the pros and cons of policing the social media accounts of kids at school. Has our list of pros and cons provided you with more clarity as a parent or teacher? In conclusion, the idea of supervising social media accounts is a contentious topic that seems to have two polar opposite sides. If you feel the need to express yourself, we invite you to add your thoughts on the topic by adding a comment to this blog.

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Brentyn

Avid movie-goer, reader, skier and language learner. Passionate about life, food and travelling.