D98 Acceptable Use Policy

This week I was tasked to search for and take a look at the social media policies for both students at staff in my district. I work for Berwyn North School District 98. Before searching for my districts policies I knew that I had read them somewhere, but I couldn't remember where. I went first to the website and found the student policy.

(Image Source) 

Student Policy

The student policy was easy to locate in the student handbook. It was listed as "Internet Acceptable Use" on page 35. While reading through this section of the student handbook I noticed that it was a good mix of students shouldn't do and what they should do. Below is an example of one part of the handbook that specifically lists actions the students are not allowed to do.  As this is in the student handbook I think it is important that there is a list of behavior that are unacceptable. The top of this list mentions that these are only examples, which I believe is great word choice so the students know that other behaviors might fall under this category as well. 

BN98 Student Unacceptable Use Policy (Image Source) 

There was also a section that listed how the students were expected to behave when using the internet. I found this section great! It reminded kids of internet basics that definitely should be repeated every year. 

BN98 Student Etiquette Policy (Image Source) 

The rest of the policy went over how the students should take care of their equipment, how the district monitors e-mails, and other important things they should know about technology in District 98. Overall, I think that my district has a well put together student policy of internet use. 

Staff Policy

After going through the student policy and finding it complete and well put together, I was excited to dive into the staff policy. I had high hopes that it would be just as complete as the student policy and just as well written. It took a little bit more time to find the staff policy. It is located in our employee handbook which is only available as a google doc to staff only. 

Once I found it, I was surprised to see that it was only five lines long. Below you can see those five lines. 

Image Source - BN98 Employee Handbook

I think that these five lines go over the basics such as use of, responsibility for, and overall purpose of the technology. I think there is a lot that could be added to this policy. I know that it is for adults and not students, but it could be much more complete. I know that there probably are staff members that do not use their technology in the correct manner because it is not stated specifically in the handbook. 

The policy states to refer to the Board Policy 6:235. I found this on page 219 of the Board Policy, which was posted to the public on the district website. This policy goes way more in depth than what the staff handbook says. 

Final Thoughts

It's interesting to me that so much thought was put into the student policy and not as much into the staff policy outside of the Board Policy document. Until this assignment I didn't even know that board policy was on the website. I wonder how many of my coworkers have taken the time to look at it. Like I said before, I understand that students need more specifics than adults, but I would think that a school district would want all their bases covered when it comes to technology. It was really interesting to dive deeper into these policies.