Can technological literacy on the part of educators help stem cyber-bullying?

Social media sites and other news sites have been flooded over the past 24 hours or so with the story of Amanda Todd, a Canadian teenager whose struggle against cyber-bullying and physical bullying led her to share her story on YouTube last month, and who passed away on October 10, 2012. An article from the Huffington Post described the extensive cyber and physical bullying that Amanda faced, prompting her to switch schools multiple times and leading her to resort to self-harm in an effort to cope with her emotional distress. Much of this bullying could have been prevented, I feel, if teachers and parents had been more aware of what was going on in this young woman's online life.

America's youth spends an increasing amount of time online or communicating through other digital means every day. This article from the New York Times cites a study from the Kaiser Family Foundation which found that children ages 8-18 generally spend up to seven and a half hours online, and an hour and a half texting every day. It is estimated that children spend up to eleven hours per day involved in some sort of media consumption or digital communication. This is a very recent phenomenon, one which has been fueled largely by the advent of sophisticated smart phones that bring the vastness of the internet to the pocket of many students. The opportunity for digital communication has increased exponentially in recent years, as chat rooms and message boards have been supplanted by social media giants such as Facebook or Twitter as the primary means for online communication. Since its launch in 2004, Facebook has grown steadily, and now boasts over one billion users. Twitter has accumulated 500 million active users since its launch in 2006, and Reddit, launched in 2005, receives more than a billion page views per month, sharing news and discussing issues mixed in with the plethora of cute cat pictures. Even smaller services garner many users, Google plus has 400 million registered, and 100 million active monthly users, and Tumblr hosts 64.7 million blogs. These are just the sites that are based on intentionally seeking out people you know, or with whom you have common interests all over the world. Other sites like Omegle (~150,000 daily pageviews) and Chatroulette (~1.5 million users) succeed on the concept of connecting people to random strangers, some hoping for casual conversation, some hoping to make friends.

Given the sheer volume of traffic these services see, and the increasing developments in technology, both online and with mobile platforms, it is a fairly safe assumption that social media is not going away, at least not for a very long time. Why, then, do so many parents choose to remain ignorant of these services and shy away from them? Why do so many educators choose to do the same? As I read the story of Amanda Todd I cannot help but think that if there had been an adult, a parent or teacher/mentor, who were more involved in her virtual life, she may not have been driven to such emotional distress that she felt there was no other way out than to end her real life. I am going to focus on what an educator could do in this situation, since I'm sure there are plenty of people who will discuss what her parents could have done in the coming days and weeks.

As educators we are encouraged to find ways to distinguish ourselves from our students, so that we do not form relationships that are anything less than professional. Many educators have taken this to mean that we should not engage in online activities that our students might engage in, and to an extent this is true. It certainly would not be appropriate for students to view a teacher's Facebook page and find pictures of them drunk at a party, or dancing questionably at a night club (though hopefully teachers have grown up and moved past this sort of behavior); a teacher can, however, establish a professional Facebook page, one from which they can manage groups or pages for their classes and/or activities. If you request, for your class, that your students "friend" your professional Facebook page for information on assignments, or for supplemental material, you have opened up an important avenue of communication and information for your students. They will be able to reach you in a manner that they are perhaps more comfortable with, and they may be willing to communicate with you digitally, whereas they would be afraid to do so in person; you will also have given yourself the ability to see your students' Facebook pages.

I use Facebook as an example, as it is the most commonly used, however these same ideas could be applied to Twitter, G+, or Tumblr. The ability to see a student's Facebook page can open a new avenue of important information to the teacher as well. If students use their personal profile (some will create a clean profile for teachers/parents and a real profile for themselves and their friends) to communicate with you, you may be able to see if they are having a difficult time at home, or with friends. DO NOT get involved directly online, this will not help and can lead to problems down the line, but if that student is misbehaving in class, it may give you an idea as to why. You may also see some of their communications with their peers, whether positive or negative. You might come across students planning to bully another student, or you may see cyber-bullying occur through Facebook. All of this information can be vital to supporting the student in the classroom or the halls, as long as teachers remember that communication with students in the digital world should be as appropriate and professional as it is in the real world.

The question then is: Once you have the information, what do you do with it? This really kind of depends on what state you are in, but here are a few general suggestions. As mentioned above, it can help you to know when to take it a little easier on a student who is acting up in class. If you observe cyber-bullying online, you can pay closer attention to the offenders over the course of your class, or even throughout the day in the halls. You could include a small segment about cyber-bullying and the issues associated with it in your lesson, or you could even discuss the issue privately with the student who has been involved. Keep in mind that since cyber-bullying does not occur on the school grounds you cannot actually take disciplinary action against the culprit in most states, but sometimes just mentioning it in class or to the student privately after class is enough. The fact that a teacher is aware of the situation could encourage students to back off. Again, DO NOT get directly involved in the situation online, it will not help the student, and it will not help you.

Again, states have varying laws concerning cyber-bullying, and there is not currently federal anti-bullying legislation*. A few numbers you may find interesting or helpful

• 49 states have anti-bullying laws, Montana is the only state that does not**.
• DC has an anti-bullying law
• Of those, only 15 states have included cyber-bullying specifically as part of those laws (AR, CA, CT, HI, KS, LA, MA, MO, NV, NH, NY, NC, OR, UT, WA)
• Proposed in GA, IL, KY, ME, and NE
• 45 states have laws concerning "electronic harassment" (the five who do not are: AK, MO, VA, VT, WI)
• DC has a law concerning "electronic harassment
• Proposed in IN and ME
• 12 states require criminal sanction (AR, ID, KY, LA, MS, MO, MT**, NV, NC, ND, TN, WI)
• DC does not require criminal sanction
• Proposed in CO, GA, MI, NY, and NC
• 43 states require school sanction (AL, MI, MT, NV, NH, OK, and RI do not require school sanction)
• 49 states require a school bullying policy, Montana again is the only state that does not
• Only 8 states include off-campus behaviors in these laws (AR, CT, LA, MA, NH, NJ, NY, SD)
• DC required to include off-campus behaviors
• Proposed in GA and NE

While you, as an educator, may be limited in the ways that you can respond to cyber-bullying, there is little reason not to do all that you can by having an online presence, and addressing it in your classroom, whatever your content area may be. Educators have a responsibility to be on the cutting edge, insofar as is possible, of technology, both in their content area and in general. Your influence could be the one thing that stops a student from making a permanent decision about a temporary problem.

*In 2009 Federal anti-cyber-bullying legislation was proposed: HR1966 (proposed in 04/2009; last action 09/2009); Megan Meier Cyberbullying Prevention Act; whoever transmits in interstate or foreign commerce any communication, with the intent to coerce, intimidate, harass, or cause substantial emotional distress to a person, using electronic means to support severe, repeated, and hostile behavior, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both. 

** State (Montana)does have a criminal statute prohibiting harassment via electronic means: “a person commits the offense of violating privacy in communications if the person knowingly or purposely: (a) with the purpose to terrify, intimidate, threaten, harass, annoy, or offend, communicates with a person by electronic communication and uses ob- scene, lewd, or profane language, suggests a lewd or lascivious act, or threatens to inflict injury or physical harm to the person or property of the person. The use of obscene, lewd, or profane language or the making of a threat or lewd or lascivious suggestions is prima facie evidence of an intent to terrify, intimidate, threaten, harass, annoy, or offend.”