Digital Citizenship for the U of S Community
“Never post anything online that you wouldn’t want your boss, mother or grandchildren to see. Facebook is not private. Twitter definitely is not private. Even email can end up in the hands of the wrong person (have you accidentally had autocomplete come up with the wrong name and then you sent the email without noticing or had someone forward a message they shouldn’t have?). I also point out the grandchildren part because the Internet is the new permanent record.”
In the undergraduate course that I teach for the College of Education I cover a lot on what’s known as “digital citizenship”. This has to do with what makes for a good citizen in the online realm. There are number of views on specific themes / topics fall under this (see resources at the end of this post), but digital citizenship is really about communicating, collaborating, sharing and creating in a respectful manner. This is a vital skill (or group of skills) that all students should learn, hopefully starting early in elementary school, with supplemental knowledge gained throughout their years of education.
But what about those who didn’t grow up with a computer, smart phone or the Internet? These are the people who still make up the majority of adults in our society and it’s important that they have a grasp of good digital citizenship as well (I don’t believe in the theory of “digital natives” and “digital immigrants”, but that’s a future blog post).
The University of Saskatchewan issued Social Networking Guidelines in 2009, which contain some excellent advice for both students and staff as to what you should or shouldn’t put out into cyberspace. The Guide includes information on using technology in general, and social networking tools specifically, with students and when communicating with others in your role as a member of the U of S community, using these tools under existing U of S academic policies, as well as valuable information about your privacy (as well as that of your students).
UPDATE – The U of S issued new social media guidelines in the summer of 2013.
As part of our roles as staff members at the U of S, it is our responsibility to model good citizenship for the students. In the age of Facebook and YouTube, that responsibility carries on into all new venues.
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