eSchool News: Carnegie Mellon University will use a $20,000 grant from the Verizon Foundation to create and distribute web safety advice to faculty, teachers, and students in K-12 schools and on college campuses.
eSchool News: The report, titled 'PointSmart.ClickSafe: Task Force Recommendations for Best Practices for Online Safety and Literacy' identifies best practices and outlines areas where government can help to increase cyber security and safety.
Education Week: A team of educators, media company officials, policymakers, and public health experts recommends that businesses provide resources and information to parents and children about online safety.
eSchool News: A federal lawmaker has introduced Internet safety legislation that, if passed, would authorize roughly $175 million, $35 million a year for 5 years, for Internet safety education and training to help schools teach safe, proper use of the web
School Library: Crafting a fenced online play yard for students is one of the safest ways for educators and parents to let children explore the Web. So says a new set of guides by the executive director of the Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use.
Reuters: Whether it is through emails, instant messaging, cell phones, texting or websites, cyberbullying is a growing problem. In the past 10 years 37 U.S. states have adopted legislation mandating that schools implement anti-bullying statutes.
CTAP: CTAP Region 6 is working with the FBI-Safe Online Surfing program to bring a workshop to the Sacramento area that is a combination of a Cybersafety presentation and an introduction to the FBI's Safe Online Surfing Internet Challenge.
eSchool News: A federal law intended to restrict children's access to internet pornography died quietly Jan. 21 at the U.S. Supreme Court, more than 10 years after Congress overwhelmingly approved it.
School Library Journal: CyberPatrol has unveiled a series of online safety videos that provide easy to understand and useful advice on how to protect children from predators, cyberbullies, inappropriate material
Education Week: The U.S. Senate last week approved a bill aimed at protecting children when they surf the Internet. It requires schools receiving federal E-rate funds to offer education about online behavior, including social networking, chat rooms...
CNET News: Three out of four teens were bullied online over the last year, according to a study released this week by psychologists at the University of California at Los Angeles.
District Administration: Do school officials have the authority to impose discipline in response to harmful off-campus online speech? Should they? This is a major challenge facing school administrators today.
NOLA: As Jefferson Parish school officials continue to integrate technology into the classroom, they are issuing a warning to students: Post derogatory messages, photos, videos or blogs against other students or employees, and there will be consequences
CNN: Teachers are beginning to use social networking sites to connect to their students, though many are speculating that these sites are not the best places for maintaining appropriate relationships.
The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction and the Children's Health Education Center have partnered to create Bullyfree Basics, a program for elementary school students that transforms lessons on the dangers of rumors and insults into animated games
eSchool News: A recent survey by internet security firm Symantec Corp. suggests that many parents are unaware of their children's internet activity and typically underestimate how often their kids encounter online threats.
eSchool News: As Virginia's schools prepare to incorporate internet safety lessons across all grade levels this fall to satisfy a landmark 2006 state law, educators are looking to schools that piloted web-safety curricula this past year for guidance
THE Journal: Channel One has partnered with i-SAFE in an effort to enhance and increase electronic safety awareness among teens. The organizations will work together to provide video programming and curriculum-based tools to students...
BillingsGazette: Montana's attorney general and state superintendent of schools unveiled a website to keep children safe from online scams and predators. The site gives advice to parents, teachers and kids on a host of Internet safety considerations.
Times-Herald: Bullies have moved from the playground to the Internet, triggering more school violence and teen suicides, a law enforcement officer told Benicia Middle School students Wednesday.
THE Journal: As tales of online cruelty mount, districts are trying a mix of prevention and punishment, incorporating internet safety into curriculum and tightening student conduct codes.
PEW Internet: At the request of the Internet Safety Task Force, Amanda Lenhart presented the Pew Internet Project's most recent data on online stranger contact, cyberbullying, the steps that teens take to ensure (or not) their online privacy...
The Boston Globe: A growing campaign is having an impact. Several Massachusetts senators are backing an act that would require every school district to create and establish a bullying prevention and response plan by July 31, 2009.
Associated Press: Va. is the first state to mandate that public schools offer Internet safety classes for all grade levels. Texas and Illinois are among states that have passed their own Internet safety education laws, but don't make the courses mandatory
The Center for Strategic and International Studies has put together a Commission on Cyber Security for the 44th Presidency and expects to have a set of recommendations ready by the end of the year.
Educators' eZine: A survey of middle school students found that 80% did not go to anyone for advice when they were cyberbullied. The reason most often listed for not telling parents or adults is the fear of retaliation.
AP: EU to spend 55 million euros on initiatives to make internet safe for children. The European Union said it will spend 55 million euros (US$83 million) between 2009 and 2013 to protect children from illegal content on the Internet and online bullying.
USA Today: A least seven states, including Iowa, Minnesota, New Jersey and Oregon, passed cyberbullying laws in 2007. Five more - Maryland, Missouri, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont - are considering similar legislation this year.
USA Today: Several incidents, along with complaints from teenagers, parents and educators, are spurring an increasing number of state lawmakers across the USA to draft legislation giving schools more power to do something about bullying over the Internet.
THE Journal: A study just published in the journal Pediatrics reports that young people are more likely to be exposed to unwanted sexual solicitations in instant messaging (IM) and chat rooms than through social networking sites.
AP/Journal star: The bill from Sen. Gwen Howard of Omaha forces districts to set anti-bullying policies by next summer. It doesn’t dictate specific actions school districts must take to prevent bullying, just that they have policies in place.
THE Journal: What has the Internet brought? That was the opening question posed to the audience at FETC during a session on Internet safety. The presenter addressed issues related to the increase of available online technologies and their implications...
The Washington Post: The effort to combat bullying by teens in Maryland's public schools and on the Internet would be strengthened under legislation being considered by state lawmakers.
PBS Frontline: Growing Up Online. This segment, now available for web viewing, deals with issues of the digital natives, as well as cyberbullying, cybersafety, and the generation gap created by Internet use and social networks.
Education Week: In recognition of growing concerns about Internet safety, the National Association of Secondary School Principals has adopted a policy statement with recommendations for educators and policymakers about Internet usage.
Reuters: Popular online teen hangout MySpace and 49 U.S. state attorneys general said on Monday they had agreed on a broad set of guidelines for protecting youths on the Internet.
AP: A teenager from west-central Minnesota will serve 100 hours of community service for using another student's MySpace page to threaten students and a teacher at Atwater-Grove City-Cosmos High School.
The School Library Journal: From the folks who brought you the failed Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA) and the successful but little loved Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA), comes a legislative initiative that librarians may love...
Baltimore Sun: As many as 1 in 3 U.S. children have been ridiculed or threatened through computer messages, according to one estimate of the emerging problem of cyberbullying. Another new study found the problem is less common, with 1 in 10 kids reporting
This site, from the Stanford University libraries, offers a complete guide to copyright, fair use, intellectual property, and other concepts important to any teacher, especially one whose students create projects using downloaded material.
Strong majority of parents teach their kids how to be safe online--but schools can still do more to help. A new survey from Common Sense Media and Cable in the Classroom finds that 85% of parents talked to their child about how to behave on the Internet.
As students return to school in Virginia, there's something new in their curriculum. Virginia is the first state to require public schools to teach Internet safety.
'Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act' would require schools receiving E-rate discounts to teach students about safe and responsible internet use.
