The
February 2011 • Issue 6 • VOL . 8
The Calgary Science School
Principal’s Message Internet safety has been an ongoing theme in schools since the early days of providing Internet access to students. While there has been continued recognition of the importance of educating young people about the risks associated with using the Internet, it has arguably been an impossible task to keep ahead of all of the ways in which this incredible resource might be misused. There are a couple of articles in this month’s Spectrum about Internet safety, as we felt it important to connect with parents once again about this topic. At CSS we have taken an approach with technology that is based on student responsibility rather than on limiting access and trying to control content. It is impossible to block all of the sites we don’t want students going to and when schools have tried to do this, they end up blocking sites that have
worthwhile content. The controls we have on our laptops are the controls that are inherent in the web browsers on each machine. We do not have a list of websites that we block. Our belief is that students need to be given true responsibility in order to learn how to take responsibility. Our philosophy has resulted in very few incidents of students accessing inappropriate websites with our laptops. We constantly monitor how students are using their laptops, we teach them about Internet safety, and we address every incident of suspected misuse of the technology. For example, as I am writing this, I randomly sampled 100 students’ laptops and used a piece of software that allows me to see what they are working on in real time. All 100 students were on task, without a single one using the laptops for anything other than their school work. That is not to say that we do not have incidents of misuse, but they are few and far between and
are approached as an opportunity to work with students on learning about responsibility. On a completely unrelated note, but on a topic which I definitely want to address here, is the Alberta Education survey on the future of charter schools. Included in this Spectrum is an article that contains background information that I strongly encourage everyone to read prior to filling out the survey. It is vital that Alberta Education hear the perspective of charter school parents and so I urge all of our parents and all other interested people (friends, other family, older siblings, etc) to become acquainted with the information in the background document, then to take some time to fill out the survey. If you would like more information, the future of charter schools survey will be a topic of discussion that our Superintendent, Dr. Garry McKinnon, will speak about at our February 3 school council meeting. Darrell Lonsberry
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