Copy of NYSCATE Wiki Page: "The Enemy Within - Stop Students from Bypassing Your Web Filters"

Note: This page was copied from the NYSCATE Wiki on 11/07/2009, at 12:30 PM. As noted at the bottom of the page, the content is covered under a Creative Commons Non Commercial Share Alike By Attribution license, and it is republished here under that license. Ordinarily, I would just link to the page, but I wanted to get a copy just in case the original page disappears. More background is available in this post.End Note

Dear Chris,

I wanted to drop you a note to let you know that I find this session title and the frame that you're using to sell your services to be offensive and beyond the pale. Our students are not our enemies and their behaviors are not rooted in violence. So long as you make them out to be, though, you'll certainly be doing our schools and our students a great deal of harm.

I suspect you're a smart dude, wise about networks and the Internet. I hope you'll hear what I'm saying here and, in the future, when speaking and teaching about the actions of our children, you'll do so in a way that doesn't make them out to be criminals. Because they're not. No more so than vendors are scoundrels that prey on our worst fears.

All the best. I'd look forward to your response.

Bud Hunt
http://budtheteacher.com

I agree entirely with Bud.

Eric MacKnight
http://www.EricMacKnight.com/

Why declare war on our students? Why encourage others to consider this offensive perspective?

I hope you find future ways to frame the issues at hand without attacking our kids.

Bernajean Porter
www.DigiTales.us

Dear Chris,

Whether I consider my world view as a father (of 2 in diapers), as an educator (who now is a 10th grade English teacher), or as a speaker/consultant (working with school architects/planners around the world, and many vendors like yourself who hope to have their products/services spec'd into projects), I am stunned by the choice you (and your entire organization, since they are indeed associated directly with the presentation) made in terms of framing the underlying reasons why someone should select a school-wide Internet management strategy with your firm.

Ultimately this is just business. And I don't mean that a vendor can pull that trigger and ignore those who disagree with sales/marketing tactics. No. What I mean is that our collective, global, 24/7, 2-way response is "just business". While we may respond as people, parents, educators, and citizens, ultimately our response is "just business". And your bottom line.

While it is tempting for me to react as a father and as an advocate for my students (and the many I support world-wide), it is within my business/consulting/speaking role that I am most perplexed by your session's title. A marketing/PR campaign that is centered on fear has limited value, esp. when kids are now the "enemies" in a system where they are actually the entire point.

Worse yet, such a marketing campaign that suggests that those who advocate for kids should see *now* their relationship with young people as nothing less than *proactive warfare* strikes me as misguided, poorly conceived, and frankly the work of a late-night presentation drafting scenario decision process as a nervous speaker tries to figure out a way to superficially dress up their presentation in order to desperately scrum for business in a desperately competitive market.

This does not seem like an industry leader's voice based on wisdom and a view of the big picture. It sounds like someone fighting to keep their job.

The language -- “The Enemy Within: Stop Students from Bypassing Your Web Filters” -- you engaged your perceived audience with is at best merely buzz-language hype. Note: As an English teacher, I give you casual props for borrowing from something that was stated long before your product came to market, but that is a side point.

At worst, your language strips the very industry you are paid to *serve* of its mission and heart, not to mention the fairly painful irony that it attacks the very group that schools exist to advocate for...and to empower.

Prior to Web 2.0 technologies, perhaps a single presentation session with a provocative title held at a distant conference (from the majority of folks now thinking quite seriously about your talk) would have gone unnoticed by those beyond the 4-walls of your session. And perhaps nothing conversationally would have taken place retroactively in terms of deconstructing the consequences of such a presentation title. 5 or 10 years ago, such a single session would be simply collecting dust now. And those educators willing to kick it around wouldn't have had an audience to even reach out to, let alone the exponential advantage of the Internet to make it as easy as hitting 'post' today.

That being said, we all know that we live in different times now.

As Bud above suggests above re: "prey[ing] on our worst fears", each of us as presenters/vendors (and I've been both countless times, Chris, in addition to my day-to-day role as a classroom educator) have the opportunity to strike a necessary/healthy balance between a) provoking audience curiosity and b)_ slandering the very demographic that we are meant to represent. While a speaker's short-term gain of drawing 'eyeballs' to a session title may in fact invite such a home-run bumper sticker mentality, the long-term strategy -- for any vendor hoping to play a leadership role in the educational market -- must be seen as representing the students'/schools' collective best interests. Period.

Like Bud states above, I do hope you'll take time to engage this conversation.

On some level, I just hope you are aware of the conversation. Note: are you on Twitter? Is your team? Are you doing a search for your session? The conference you just spoke at? Key hashtags with your company's name mentioned? How about an RSS feed and Google search of blog entries that mention you, your prezo, and your company? No? Yes? Maybe starting today?

Whatever intentions may have lay at the center of your presentation strategy, until you respond here (and on the many platforms we're all using) this conversation will clearly steer towards a very active/dynamic/global educator/tech-director audience that will keep it alive on their terms for quite some time. This will most likely occur whether you respond or not, but at least your later voice may steer folks towards a better understanding of what you were trying to do. Perhaps from your P.O.V., the title was a simple nudge; perhaps it was meant ironically. Perhaps not. But until you engage, it no longer matters. It has become the poster (session) boy for all that is wrong in the industry of vendors that *serve* schools...and kids.

This, as you can tell, might be valuable to consider from the vantage point of your company's reputation, marketing strategy, and bottom line in a very tough economy.

Oh, and keep in mind that many of those that are going to re-tweet, cross-link to, and blog about your session are the very decision-makers that you and your team may call upon at your next pitch or trade show floor booth. Just a thought.

With that in mind, this 24/7/global conversation that is happening in part on your very presentation wiki -- ironic, no? -- and the long-term implications about your organization's credibility, in fact is *live*. And it never turns off. Even if it goes quiet, for a bit, it stays live...until Google connects the dots with a search and your company's name pops up through the magical world of search-engine algorithms. Guess what? There is a very good chance that these wiki, blog, Facebook, Twitter, and you-name-it apps will be ranked higher than your own company's web site over time. Ironic, no? But quite plausible.

You see, this conversation -- this very real, 24/7 global conversation is being held not just here on your (open, editable) wiki page, but is gaining momentum on countless educator/ed-tech blogs (and RSS feeds/subscriptions), via Facebook, via Twitter (with constant "retweets" of other bloggers who are speaking about your session/company), etc, and growing by the day. Do the math. How many hours, days have passed since your talk? Now, how many folks who were *not* even in your session, in those 4-walls, are now talking about your session, your company, your marketing language...and what it all says about the vendors that ought to be given a seat at the table when it is time to make a buying decision.

Given your role within the technology industry, certainly you can do the math as to what this might suggest as the 'conversation' begins to gain momentum. And remember what I suggested above: many of those using FB, Twitter, blogs, etc to talk about this issue and your role in it, are the very decision-makers when you come to make a sale. People well beyond the 4-walls of your single session are now 'seeing' your very session as 'ground zero' + an indicator of everything that is wrong with our current educational system and vendor-oriented construct.

Trust me: they do *not* see it as a call to arms to 'protect schools from students' as you may have intended recently.

NO. They see it as a very different call to arms, one no longer in favor of your organization or semantic word play.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts and ideas for moving forward. Either way, you've given a great number of us in the edu-blogosphere something very meaty to chew on for a bit.

Sincerely,
Christian Long
Twitter: @christianlong
Blog: think:lab

Dear Chris,

I wanted to echo the thoughts of the other writers here. Our students are never the enemy in our schools. Our schools are of and for them. I don't know if the title of this conference was an attempt at humor or if you truly view your job as protecting schools from their students, but either way, it is in bad taste and puts you, your product and your company in a very poor light.

The purpose of school is to educate... and in 2009, that should include teaching students to be responsible, smart and wise digital citizens. Casting our relationship with our students as an "us v. them" or a "good guys v. enemy" light makes that job more difficult and reinforces some students' belief that school is not about or for them.

I would hope that you would reconsider the title and message of this session as well as make a formal apology to the students and educators that it demeans. I'll be at NYSCATE on Sunday and Monday morning if you wish to further this discussion.

Yours truly,
Chris Lehmann
Founding Principal
Science Leadership Academy
Keynote Speaker -- NYSCATE 2009
Twitter: @chrislehmann
Blog: Practical Theory

Dear Chris-

I hope that you come to understand that a relevant curriculum and engaging instruction is a much more beneficial use of time, for students, teachers and IT staff, than finding ways to filter students. Blocking students from the world is not education. I realize that you, like all of us, are interested in making money. I also understand that it's not your fault there is a market for your product, based on administrators and parents who fail to understand the harm done by not allowing students a global education. But you aren't promoting educational growth by how you present your product.

I wish you the best and hope our thoughts allow you and your company to re-evaluate your priorities.

Josh Allen
Twitter: @j_allen
Blog: Tech Fridge

Hello, Chris,

I have two issues with this post. First, as others have pointed out, demonizing students (ie, describing them as "the enemy") as part of a business plan shows a blatant disrespect for the reasons schools exist in the first place: to educate students.

Second, your presentation assumes that filters are a necessary thing, and a good use of school resources. I would love to see your business plan shift from an us vs them mentality into something that put scant educational resources where they belong: how to support students and teachers develop critical thinking skills to evaluate material when the filter is off.

For what it's worth, the person/people that came up with this session title could also benefit from some additional training on critical thinking skills, and knowing how to effectively frame an issue.

Cheers,

Bill Fitzgerald
twitter: http://twitter.com/funnymonkey
Blog: http://funnymoney.com/blog