SRPE, teacher ‘de-friending' district media policy

A Santa Rosa Professional Educators member is looking to file a lawsuit today against the school district on a new social networking policy.

The educator believes a new board policy is restricting educators from freely using social sites such as Facebook, which has over 400 million active users.

 The lawsuit is expected to be filed sometime this afternoon by Marie Locklin Bodi, a third grade teacher at Gulf Breeze Elementary School and SRPE treasurer according to SRPE president Rhonda Chavers.

The policy that is being questioned is the Acceptable Use and Risk Policy, which was expanded this past summer after a school district employee attended a social networking seminar hosted by a communications attorney.

“After the presentation, they came back and wrote this document that restricts what teachers can and cannot do outside of the classroom,” Chavers said.

The new social media policy that was added to the Acceptable Use Policy “advises” how employees should interact on sites such as Facebook or on e-mail programs when they are at work or working from home according to Bill Emerson, assistant superintendent for curriculum, instruction and assessment.

The nine-page policy covers blogs, tweets, e-mails and chat room behaviors. 

According to Chavers, teachers are subject to sign the policy by Friday. Those who do not sign the policy will not be allowed to access the district’s communication network, or according to Chavers can be terminated.

News on the intended lawsuit came to the district last Friday.

“If they don’t sign it (the policy), they have to attest in front of two administrative witnesses that they didn’t sign it,” Chavers said. “A lot of SRPE members have come to me concerned over what is in this policy.

“When they sign, they have to agree with everything that is in the policy.”

Emerson said the teachers would not have to have two witnesses to attest to the denial to sign the social media agreement, and that it would not go against them in any way.

Chavers said a lot of the teachers are concerned that the policy has too many restrictions and takes away their first amendment right.

The SRPE president said one of the topics the policy restricts is posting on blogs or sites anonymously..

Chavers said that portion goes against the teacher’s individual first amendment rights.

SRPE is also considering filing a second unfair labor practice lawsuit within 180 days after the initial lawsuit against the policy today. 

Chavers said the school district should not have the ability to terminate an employee if they do not agree with the policy, especially one that she says was drawn up for employees and never fully explained to them.

Emerson stated only the Acceptable Use Policy can terminate or suspend an employee if they go against the document, not the social media policy.  He also stated they are not required to sign the social media document, but it will be recorded that they did not sign it.

The social media policy signature he says is just to acknowledge employees read the social media section of the Acceptable Use Policy and that they understand it. 

“This signature is not required, it just makes teachers aware that they could be creating public recorded documents when posting on these sights,” Emerson said.

Chavers said she spoke with Vicki Beagle, Director of In-service and Instructional Technology who helped write the policy concerning the complaints and wanted the policy to be revamped.  The president said she did not revamp it, but only added it to the Acceptable Use Policy and required a separate signature on a different page, keeping the rest of the document the same.

“We were surprised to hear they filed a lawsuit against this,” Emerson said.  “We made revisions and gave directions for employees to ask questions if they had them.”

The policy outlines how adding a student or a student’s parent on a social networking site is not recommended, and using the district’s work e-mail for personal use is prohibited.

The policy also states that anything posted on a social media website whether it is opinion or not, constitutes as public record.

Santa Rosa County students are also required to sign a similar online policy.  That policy tells students that anything that is published on Facebook that slanders a school employee or a student is public record.  And that action may be punishable if it creates a disturbance at the school. 

Sites such as Facebook and Myspace are blocked by the school district’s Internet browsers.

“You can’t cross out inside the document what you don’t agree with,” Chavers said.  “Not only do we have a lawsuit, but we have an unfair labor practice suit.”

Chavers said another big concern was the fact that the policy stated the school district had the right to use an employees picture, e-mail address and title on their website or any other website, which she said is bringing up privacy concerns with district employees.

Emerson told the Press Gazette this is not the case.

“That is a statement of permission,” he said. “If they want to post their name, e-mail and creative work on our website, they can do so. But they are not forced to do so.”

Emerson also stated if a teacher does not feel comfortable with having their information on the school’s website, it can be taken down.

Emerson said on Monday that the school district was willing to sit down with SRPE and Bodi to help explain the policy to avoid the lawsuit.

“We will sit down with the union leadership, which is what we want to do before a lawsuit is filed,” Emerson said. ”This document does not put a restriction on social media access, it just advises employees of the risks of using these programs.”