Well, obviously, the problem isn’t the “screwing up”, it’s that the teacher was caught, so you make that more difficult. In this case, the Kearney school district has decided to ban tape recorders in the classroom. That sounds smart.
It makes me wonder how many teachers other than David Paszkiewicz are peddling ignorant cant in Kearney classrooms, that they have to make a special effort to protect them from exposure.
Oh, and my students can tape my classes any time they want.
Sounds like typical school administration to me. They’re not interested in justice or fairness, they’re interested in quiet.
Also sounds like a good time for all those folks with “nothing to hide” when it comes to the president’s wiretapping program to suddenly start caring about their 4th Amendment rights.
Sweet hypocrisy and ass-covering.
They also “added training for teachers on the legal requirements for separating church and state,” which I think is a valid response.
Typical cover-ass tactic.
Some Universities in America put lectures online. Audio and Video. Quite interesting.
Merf? Dude, PZ, you stand and talk for an hour. In high school, teachers do much more than that. Often teachers talk about students private matters in a setting that is only almost private. In addition, teachers go out of their way to try to prevent students from pulling potentially harmful pranks. If a student needs extra help, teachers will gladly give it to them. If they cannot hear, they should sit closer or maybe need to work out a technological solution like a microphone of some sort.
For you to suggest that teachers should be okay with students having the right to surveillance them because they should have nothing to hide sounds like rather Bush-like thinking to me.
Aside from the fact that this decision is clearly a harsh reaction to the Paskiewicz situation and not an attempt to protect honest teachers (more like protect loons such as Paskiewicz), recording lectures can be an extremely helpful tool to help students keep up, especially if they can’t keep up writing notes.
I’m sure someone else can eviscerate you far more effectively, but this ridiculousness demanded an immediate response.
I don’t think it’s the idea of taping per se that’s being objected to, it’s the fact that this is that school board’s only response to a particular situation in which a teacher said things that should have never been said in a school classroom. Rather than addressing the specific teacher, or adding more training for teachers on the subjects that should or shouldn’t be discussed in class, they decided to focus instead on the means by which the evidence was collected. Making it impossible to collect evidence of a problem doesn’t mean that the problem will magically go away.
It’s very similar to a situation at my school in which a few computer science department employees managed to hack into the main network system and get all of the passwords for the campus. They promptly reported the security hole, and instead of making the system more secure, the administrative response was to reprimand the employees for being in a part of the system they shouldn’t have been in. Again, refusing to listen to information is not equivalent to fixing the problem.
Link to the NY Times story
Kenneth J. Lindenfelser, the board’s lawyer, said classes were being planned to inform students of their constitutional rights, to encourage them to come forward with questions and to explain that people “who exercise their rights should not be viewed negatively.”
Meanwhile, Matthew said that Mr. Paszkiewicz recently told the class that scientists who spoke about the danger of global warming were using tactics like those Hitler used, by repeating a lie often enough that people come to believe it.
Mr. Lindenfelser said that the district did not investigate the report of that comment, which he said was not religious or a violation of “any kind of law.”
This idiot should be disbarred.
Whoops. Messed up my italics tags. Whatever. This guy should be investigated by the bar anyway.
A teacher is a public servant who works, for a considerable amount of the time, in an environment where there is no reasonable expectation of privacy. Some student/teacher conversations should be kept confidential; one example which springs readily to mind is a student reporting to a trusted teacher an instance of harassment (sexual or otherwise). But when the teacher speaks to the entire class, the class has every reason to listen. Students are expected to take notes. A tape recorder is, in principle, only a notebook which catches everything, and that’s only a problem if the teacher is saying something which he shouldn’t.
It’s the transparent society, people. Get used to it. The recorders are only becoming more prolific. We had best use them to enforce accountability upon those in power, or else we give up privacy and earn only subservience.
What galls me the most is that the school board, by adding training about church/state separation, is implicitly acknowledging that Paszkiewicz did wrong. They admit — or were forced to admit — that the teacher was in error, but then they shut down the means for errors to be reported. This is not consistent thinking. It is two-faced, Janus-headed political hypocrisy.
Sheesh. I was just sitting in the tub reminiscing about my own experiences like this when I was in high school.
1. Recognize problem
2. Figure out solution
3. Try to discuss problem and solution with principal
4. Find yourself suspended for a week.
In my case, because I had no family support system (or food), I was in no shape to deal with this crap on my own and ended up dropping out since I had bigger worries (finding food.)
How many bright but struggling kids are chewed up by “educators” with this kind of attitude?
Rey Fox, I think you’re mistaken. It’s not just school administration that prizes quiet over justice, it’s all authority. It is the citizens’ duty to demand justice instead of quiet at all times.
Tape recorders aren’t just used for busting teachers. I used one in high school to obtain proof that a guy was harassing me. They’re quite handy.
What I’m trying to say is, screw that school with their crazy teachers and their messed up rules.
Often teachers talk about students private matters in a setting that is only almost private.
Perhaps, then, teachers should avoid talking about a students private matters when other students are present.
How hard is it to get a teacher fired?
I’m reminded of the frequent speculation whenever a teacher is “caught” teaching evolution in a Bible-belt school district. It’s often assumed around here that such a teacher’s job is forfeit the minute a Fundie parent screams. Is that true? Could this fool get fired by a small, noisy group of parents complaining loudly to the school board? How long would that take?
For you to suggest that teachers should be okay with students having the right to surveillance them because they should have nothing to hide sounds like rather Bush-like thinking to me.
If I remember correctly, an important part of this case was the fact that the teacher continued to deny the things he had said, until the student was able to provide evidence in the form of a recording.
If the student had not been able to record the class, would he even have been able to press the case at all?
Having classes to educate students on their rights is all well and good, but that’s going to do exactly nothing if the kids can’t bring attention to teachers who are violating those rights. It sounds to me like the kid who brought the teacher’s actions to light didn’t need educating in his rights–he needed a teacher who wasn’t going to lie straight to the principle’s face when questioned about it.
“For you to suggest that teachers should be okay with students having the right to surveillance them because they should have nothing to hide sounds like rather Bush-like thinking to me.”
Um, Bush was trying to surveillance private citizens in their privates lives, while teaching (as discussed here) is a public act. These situations are night and day. Think of it like this: … If I am walking down a public street and someone takes a picture, and I end up in it, I can’t do squat because I was in public, but if I am in my own home, and someone sneaks up and takes pictures of me through a window, then I am being intruded upon….
As for dealing with private matter with students, that student should be allowed to tape them if he/she so desires, and if the teachers is so close to others that they could record these privates talks, then that teacher has all ready made those private matters public.
I usually tell my students that they can record my if they like, as long as they don’t try to sell the copies or post them all over the Internet.
It’s no big deal for me. But then again, I don’t try to “teach” creationism in my class, either.
Of course, this means you can do the old depends what the definition of ‘is’ is a la contragate.
So tape recorders are banned; well sir, this is a minidisc recorder, no tape there. Or a compact flash recorder, no tape there either. Or a SD recorder, nope still no tape. I left my mobile phone on and streamed the entire thing directly onto the Internet. Aha, I used my laptop, so it’s recorded to hard disk, not a sign of tape anywhere. etc.
It’s like a little slice of Afghanistan, right here in the U.S. Teacher expresses his flavor of his religion as fact. Irate student reports him. Administration tries to prevent students from reporting such things in the future. The majority of the local families seem to be applauding. Applauding!
This is disgusting.
And, yes, teaching is a public act. For the love of critical thinking, it had better be! This is publicly-funded education; every taxpayer has a right to a recording of the proceedings, by virtue of having /paid for it/.
Let’s generalize this, shall we?
Person A: *makes lewd and threatening comments to person B*
Person B: *tries to record it and files suit*
Person A: *gets the recording thrown out, because it was a “private” conversation*
What an absurd violation of justice! I wish I lived there, to campaign against these people. The first thing that came to mind: “When, in the course of human events…”
So the school board bans all audio recording devices…
Then a kid brings in one of those stenograph dohickeys, and they are banned…
Then a kid starts taking shorthand notes of what is actually said, so shorthand is banned…
Then kids form specially trained teams to timeshare longhand note taking activities, so taking longhand notes are banned…
Then kids with eidetic memories write the dialogue up later, so listening is banned…
Reductio ad absurdum. Job done, no education undertaken.
Even going back to the 70’s when I was at university, which was, I know, back in the dark ages, we used to tape lectures or tutorials if we could.
No one seemed to worry too much about it and it gave one the opportunity to go over the lecture at leisure and try and digest what was being said. It was also a great way to make notes.
As with all of these things, it is the potentially compulsory nature of these things which should set off warning bells. Mandatory video survelliance or mandatory auditory survelliance would be a definitive “no no”.
I can’t believe they didn’t fire the teacher because of his crappy understanding of history and of science. And they say he’s the best history teacher in the school.
Ouch.
Um. Have you ever taken a college class? Office hours. Scheduled appointments. Dropping in at lab and tutoring. College professors have plenty of interaction opportunities with students other than lecturing at them, although certainly some avoid those opportunities.
And that’s a bad thing. Teachers shouldn’t be talking about private matters in front of other students whether or not they’re taping it.
The students should get some readily available bugging equipment and routinely record everything, transfering files off-campus for safeguarding. Then when wrongs are done, release the audio files onto the Internet so that the whole world is listening, and the case gets tried in the court of public opinion.
Nobody who works for me would ever want to conceal anything from me, unless they are doing dirty things.
It would probably be more effective to publicize the home phone numbers and addresses of the school administration.
I’m still dumbfounded that the teacher is staying on at that school.
Mike Fox:
aside: the word you are reaching for is surveil. It’s become sufficiently common in this context to be standard.
Many high school kids with learning disabilities use recording devices to what goes on in class, instead of handwriting notes. Many have such devices specified in the students’ Individual Education Plans.
I’d guess that there is more than one such student in the district.
I hear the ADA/IDEA lawyers thundering in!
I’m telling!
Understand something. (It took me a long time to understand it). The school administrators are not really interested in complying with the law, and they aren’t particularly interested in educating their students. What they are really interested in is minimizing their administrative burden. So, instead of discharging a horse’s ass of a teacher who violates the law by proseletyzing the “community’s” religion, and thereby offending at least a noisy plurality of the town’s electorate, they will choose to make it more difficult to obtain evidence of the teachers’ transgressions. Of course they will fail in that effort (how small can cell phones be made?) but they’ll try none the less.
That’s the life of a burocrat. To minimize their problems, not to follow the law.
Liz Ditz
You’re absolutely correct. That is why I was quick to point out that teachers are glad to help when asked. When a student does something like bring a foreign object into class, a teacher needs to know about it. If a student has a need, that student needs to make it known.
In this case the student should have gotten approval to have the audio recording device in class from an administrator. If the administrator refused, he should have the administrator give him refusal in writing. In this case, I doubt this student had an IEP, let alone one that involved an audio recording device.
And why do I feel that such devices should not be in the classroom? It is not because teachers have a right to privacy while they are teaching. It is because students have a right to privacy when they are in a location that is legally mandated for them to be in (public but not optional). It is also because gadgets of all sorts are notorious distractors in classrooms, which can be used in malicious and even dangerous ways.
Most importantly, there is very little lecturing in modern high school classrooms. Audio recoding devices aren’t needed in most normal high school situations (yeah, this was far from normal, but the student failed to ask an administrator for permission). Teachers instead tend to give worksheets to kids and only talk for five minutes or so at each end of class. The teacher supervises and makes sure kids are on task.
More than likely that teacher should have been reprimanded or fired. Frankly, he probably was reprimanded and we just don’t know about it. However, the student shouldn’t have brought in an audio recording device without permission.
The fact is that almost everyone commenting here fails to see that the child did wrong, too. I am sick of all the enabling adults out there who think that teaching is easy and clean because they know exactly what shouldn’t be done as a teacher. It’s just like the OJ Simpson trial where the police didn’t file all their paperwork correctly. Did OJ do wrong? Yes. But so did the one trying to prove he did wrong.
Mike Fox
Oh hell, most of the student’s lives in school are “surveilled”; in the hallways, the caf, the library, etc. Probably the bathrooms, too. Today’s teens are growing up in a fishbowl, and authority thinks it should be exempt.
Welcome to the Panopticon.
Could this fool get fired by a small, noisy group of parents complaining loudly to the school board? How long would that take?
Hell, could he get fired by a large, noisy group of concerned science-type people complaining loudly (or writing)? Because I am totally ready to give it a try. As a public high school student who was dragged to a mandatory “pep rally” that consisted mainly of a youth minister telling us what we should think about Jesus, I find this stuff really, really infuriating.
It is also because gadgets of all sorts are notorious distractors in classrooms, which can be used in malicious and even dangerous ways.
if the recorder was used as a distraction in a classroom, you would have a point. for example, there has been legitimate debate over whether students should be allowed to have their laptops in class, as the constant typing if they are being used to type notes can easily distract other students and even the professor.
however, a tape recorder does not provide that type of distraction in any way.
what someone does with an object is entirely divorced from what the object itself is.
If i take a pencil, and stab a fellow student in the leg with it, that would be quite a distraction. should we then ban pencils in the classroom?
hardly; there is no inherent distraction to how pencils are normally used in a classroom, just like with a recorder.
(no, let’s not extend this to a debate about gun control)
as to the privacy of other students issues, I don’t think you can show that in a public classroom, there is any legal expectation of privacy.
I could be wrong, but I don’t recall any legal statutes regarding the level of privacy inherent in a classroom.
the child, under the circumstances involved, had no other recourse to be able to prove his contentions than the way he did.
the solution is not to ban the tape recorder, or say he was wrong for doing it, the solution is to provide reliable avenues for students to report misbehaving teachers to begin with that wouldn’t require the use of clandestine recording equipment.
duh.
oh, and your comparison to the OJ case is totally irrelevant.
Beep Beep it’s me –
As with all of these things, it is the potentially compulsory nature of these things which should set off warning bells. Mandatory video survelliance or mandatory auditory survelliance would be a definitive “no no”.
Acually, it is common in most districts, for the principal’s to listen in on the teachers in their schools periodicaly. They just flip a switch and listen throuhg the PA. If there is a problem, such as this one, the admin. can listen in any time.
So they have, and should have, mandatory surveilance, they just don’t always use it like they should. But there is no reason that the people who educate children, should have privacy while they do it.
Ichthyic —
You’re correct; you can stab someone with a pencil. In some classes, some students aren’t allowed to have pencils. The reason is that the risk for harm is greater than the reward of being able to use it with classwork. If said students needed a pencil, however, they should get permission before having one in class.
The student had reliable avenues to the goal he sought. He chose not to take them and broke protocol. For that I have no sympathy.
Mike Fox
The student had reliable avenues to the goal he sought. He chose not to take them and broke protocol. For that I have no sympathy.
that’s not the impression we get from looking at the responses, either from the child or the establishment.
so i ask you to back that up by showing us exactly what avenues realistically were available to the child to broach the subject of misconduct, given that without tape evidence, it would be just his word against the teachers. Moreover, given the apparently hostile reaction to his charges, you simply cannot say he felt more than open to bring a challenge without such evidence to back up his charges to begin with.
please, do specify that anything in your last post goes beyond speculation on your part.
otherwise, the safe approach is to think he really did have no alternative, as stated by the child himself.
In some classes, some students aren’t allowed to have pencils. The reason is that the risk for harm is greater than the reward of being able to use it with classwork.
uh, thanks for rehashing my point?
Translation: the kid managed to get around the deliberately-sabotaged avenues left open, becoming dangerously effective, and we can’t have that.
First, it seems stupid to try to ban an unbannable item like a recording device, especially when schools (like mine) are now issuing laptops to students to be brought to class.
Second in my school system a teacher is fired when a panel of 5 other teachers find them guilty, it can obviously go into more legal debate aswell.
third PZ comparing teaching University to teaching high school is about as similar as creationism to evolution. They have totaly seperate rules etc. they only share the concept of learning.
Fourth, the kid screwed up, he was obviously trying to nail the teacher. He should have filed a complaint and an evaluation would have ensued. He had so many other options then recording what a teacher said.
Anything can be taken out of context or easily edited to sound ridiculous. And when the right to prosecute a person is given to imature emotional and often angry students the process of fair evaluation goes out the window.
The teacher should not have been saying what they were saying, but the right to judge a teacher (about keeping their job) does not belong to a young student, they should file formal complaints or speak to the person they are having a problem with.
Ichthyic nothing a teacher does is private when a teacher gets a haircut there are 4 classes of 30 wonderful sponges to absorb it. Any form of investigation would have shown the truth. To be able to constantly speak about religion in class and not have many students complain or remember is ridiculous.
The student skipped the appropriate avenues for the effect of the tape recorder.
Mike Fox-
Wow, I was giving you the benefit of the doubt up until that last post, but, man, you either are not in possession of basic facts here, or you’re being tendentiously dishonest.
The kid complained to the administration and was ignored. Even after he made the recording, he tried in the conference with the teacher and principal to get the teacher to be honest of his own free will, and the administrators to take his complaints seriously. Only when that failed did he pull out the recording. Furthermore, this teacher had apparently been behaving in this fashion for years with no consequences from the administration. Anyone who’s read even one semi-thorough article on the case should know these things.
This was a kid who took action against abuse of authority and illegal behavior by an adult, in a fully legal and frankly courageous fashion… and he’s now suffering the consequences from his community of not sitting down and shutting up. As someone who apparently thinks kids like Matthew should sit down and shut up for the sake of “protocol,” you aren’t as far from those local yokels as you’d like to think you are.
And it worked, didn’t it? While the teacher was not fired, it got out.
Had he taken this to the school administration, I bet money that A) We’d never have heard about it, and B) Nothing would ever be done. The kid would be told to shut up and stop trying to cause trouble, and that would be the end of it.
Teachers are entrusted to educate the next generation. If they are failing that duty, it should be known, not covered up.
John W., ditto to you. What planet are you people living on? This administration clearly had no intention of holding this teacher accountable for his behavior, and the appropriate avenues are deliberately blocked.
Which student is “prosecuting” anyone? This student gathered factual evidence to be introduced into the standard process for investigating such a complaint, because he knew damn well the process would work against him otherwise.
Who’s an immature, emotional and angry in this situation? This student sounds like a remarkably mature and intelligent individual for his age (and clearly a lot more mature than many of the adults in the community, including his history teacher).
What’s with this authoritarian streak in your mindset? “Yeah, this teacher was terribly wrong but the student should just meakly submit anyway and he’s a brat for not doing it.”
No, same planet.
Sorry I was a little frustrated there. Where I teach when a formal complaint is made the teacher is removed from the classroom usually for many months! Even with an innocent verdict most teachers never come back, because they are too embarassed. Obviously the administration at that school is under the same viel as the teacher in terms of what is right.
I was not speaking of this child but children in general. Because children are forced to sit and be constantly judged they do get upset and rightly so. I was simply envisioning an army of nanopods and editing programs releasing out of context comments of teachers because they got bad grades or detention.
I have seen many proven innocent teachers not return to work because of a single students unjustified complaints. That teacher should not have been talking about religion he should have been repremanded and then fired. I am sorry I was emotional or authoritarian.
Did the student try going to the district office to make a formal complaint or was it an in-house administration complaint? Because there is big difference.
Wow,
I’ve been a high school science teacher for 5 years now. While I agree, in spirit, with the idea of busting a creationist whacko that is using a public platform to pollute the minds of kids, I DO NOT agree that a kid should have the the freedom to bring a recording device into the classroom and record activities without the permission of the administration or the classroom teacher.
While, certainly, one can argue that the student was justified in his actions, in this case, that justification is not appropriate in every case of a student bringing a recording device into a classroom. I would love to have grown up in a world where every kid that steps into the classroom is a responsible, well meaning, self actualized individual. I didn’t grow up in that world, and I don’t teach in that world.
I teach 13-17 year old kids who are learning how to be responsible, well meaning, self individuals. It’s a looooong road and they aren’t there yet. For every 1 kid that wants to bust a incompetent teacher in the act of being incompetent so school will be a better place to learn, I probably have 20 kids that would just love to catch me picking my nose so they can put the video on Myspace or Youtube. I don’t blame them for it. They are kids. That’s how kids think and that’s what kids do. That’s why they are in school to learn and why, at my school, electronic devices and even cell phones are contraband and can be confiscated on sight. The reality is, some kids aren’t even ready to use an Ipod responsibly in a school setting.
That’s not to say that I have anything to hide in my classroom. Administrators routinely enter my classroom unannounced to observe. Parents are welcome. I have student teachers, district observers, you name it, coming through my classroom, sometimes unannounced. I had a class today that was photographed by a school official. Everyone, however, has gone through the proper channels to be there.If a kid wanted to record a lecture or lesson, all he/she has to do is ask me. If there is enough demand from my students, I’d do it myself. I think, however, they are already overwhelmed with notes, handouts, worksheets, and any DVD copy of a PowerPoint lecture that I give away freely if they ask for it.
I want to believe that the kid in question, in this case, was at his wits end with a truly incompetent teacher that needed a kick in the ass to get the message. I want to believe that the studnent had no other recourse. I would love to see the whacko teacher barred from teaching until assurances are made that no more preaching will take place in the classroom. However, in this case thus far, I don’t find any action taken by school officials to be uncalled for.
Well said Wells…
It’s very similar to a situation at my school in which a few computer science department employees managed to hack into the main network system and get all of the passwords for the campus. They promptly reported the security hole, and instead of making the system more secure, the administrative response was to reprimand the employees for being in a part of the system they shouldn’t have been in. Again, refusing to listen to information is not equivalent to fixing the problem.
Actually, the administrative response should have been to fix the security hole AND reprimand the employees.
Security testing done without proper permission is called “unauthorized use of a computer” and it’s illegal in Canada and the USA.
FHS
You have one year on me, but the rest of your post is spot on! I was hoping someone would present this view so I wouldn’t have to type it all. I’ve been reading a lot of material from people who don’t seem to actually understand how a public school classroom actually functions.
BTW – forgot to mention my opinion of the actual case being discussed. It appears to me that the student had tried all appropriate avenues for redress and those avenues failed. He was forced to take an action that would be disapproved of normally. I think his actions are an excellent example of Civil Disobedience. It was wrong but incredibly necessary!
To be able to constantly speak about religion in class and not have many students complain or remember is ridiculous.
The student skipped the appropriate avenues for the effect of the tape recorder.
these two sentences contradict each other, though you apparently don’t see this.
If the teacher was continually (as evidenced by what other students said as well) spouting nonsense and religious beliefs in the classroom, and nobody had ever reported him of it before… what should that tell you?
your approach would invalidate every tattletale law ever passed.
I suggest you rethink what avenues were REALLY open to this kid.
I also suggest you go back to the original postings on the matter, as much of what actually happened is explained in detail there, and NO WAY did this kid just “have it in” for this teacher, and proceed to attempt to frame him with a tape recorder.
… indeed, the environment of the students in that instructor’s course was overwhelmingly SUPPORTIVE of his religious proclamations.
in that kind of environment, can’t you think of reasons why “regular channels” would not have been effective??
Where I teach when a formal complaint is made the teacher is removed from the classroom usually for many months!
that was my experience too, but it certainly isn’t that way in all districts, that’s for sure.
I probably have 20 kids that would just love to catch me picking my nose so they can put the video on Myspace or Youtube.
and this troubles you?
why?
do you really care if a high school student post a video of you picking your nose?
obviously a ridiculous example, but the only real way to deal with the issue is to have a bit of self-confidence yourself, and laugh at the little stuff.
as raised previously, if a student is causing a distraction IN the classroom (which a student standing there with a video recorder likely would), then you can legitimately claim that as disruptive behavior, and have the camera and/or offender removed from your classroom.
but to think you have any right to privacy while teaching in a public classroom, or to take what a 13 year old posts on a website personally, that smacks of insecurity to me.
I want to believe that the kid in question, in this case, was at his wits end with a truly incompetent teacher that needed a kick in the ass to get the message.
then rest easy, as that appears in fact to be the case.
although whether the teacher in question actually GOT the message in the end is open to debate.
RE du wayne
“Acually, it is common in most districts, for the principal’s to listen in on the teachers in their schools periodicaly. They just flip a switch and listen throuhg the PA. If there is a problem, such as this one, the admin. can listen in any time.”
You gotta be kidding me? The schools systems here would never put up with such a breach. (Australia) If teachers were to be videoed or monitored with listening devices, I will be the first to demand that they are installed in Parliament House so that I can listen to all the converstions of the Prime Minister. Oh, and in his bedroom too, as I wanna hear his wife say “Not tonight darling, I have a headache.”
You gotta be kidding me? The schools systems here would never put up with such a breach. (Australia)
really?
Can a school administrator be held liable for the actions of the teachers in any given Australian school?
If so, is it really a ‘breach’, if the responsibility of the administration is in part to make sure their employees are following australian law?
how would you, if you were an administrator, keep up with your responsibility in this area, and not have that alone take up all your time?
I have no children, so I have only a secondary bone to pick with these clowns.
However, I am Jewish. If I did have school age children, and some teacher was a Christian Creep who started pushing his crap in my kids science class, there would be no “negotiations” with the school board.
They would have 24 hours to fire the teacher, or in 25 hours I would be speaking to a lawyer. With in 48 hours the school board would get a demand letter about the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
If the teacher was still employed by the school, with in a week they would receive the subpoena for the lawsuit.
This is going to sound Orwellian, but it would be *great* if teachers could routinely train a video camera on their class in action. Not only could you see how your presentation was coming off, but my goodness you could certainly nail some aberrant behaviour now and then.
But then, here’s the thing: districts won’t let you videotape students without signing a consent form, even for a one-time thing. Regular recording would never be sanctioned. And yet, to hear some folk here, why shouldn’t a kid be allowed to shoot video of the classroom without the instructor’s consent? Seems to be a double standard. Even audio recording requires some sort of understanding, I think.
So, personally, I don’t want to see students pulling out their cameras, cell phones or mp3 players without asking. But what I really want to know is: why hasn’t the district suspended/reprimanded this bozo of a ‘teacher’ who exceeded his bounds? The question of whether or not student recording without consent should be banned (a policy, and as far as I can see, legal) is clearly of less moot than violating the Establishment Clause (the law of the land)?
Ichthyic it is not this situation in question that I have a real problem with.
The student was obviously stuck in a religious community type school and decided to fight back.
It seems the real problem was the administartion not making it clear enough to the teacher in question that he was, in fact, an idiot.
The proclamation that students should not bring any recording devices into a class without permission is still correct. If they are denied permission they certainly have a right to ask why.
In terms of whether the teacher got the message, he did not. I am sure of it, he wouldn’t have done it if he didn’t truly believe that he was doing the right thing, telling him he was wrong won’t matter.
Unfortunatly, school systems change slowly and old creationist teachers are definitly on their way out. It doesn’t seem fair that you can’t just find them and sack them all at once, but in the end the only way that religion will stay in the schools is during an appropriatly contexted history class so evolution wins no matter what, it is only a matter of time.
With media circulating at a rate faster then we can keep up with it’s not hard to imagine a situation where a somebody could get hurt. It happens all the time in public places, classrooms are supposed to be safe places where students can be at ease and ask the (sometimes silly) questions that they all have.
This reminds me- although the cases are not perfectly analogous- of one of Richard Feynman’s anecdotes about his time at Los Alamos.
After delivering a top-secret report to a colonel, Feynman cracked his safe- partly for fun, but also to demonstrate the security risk of such safes. Feynman had discovered in his free time that it was relatively easy to find the combination of many safes if you had brief access to them while they were open. The colonel was duly impressed and said he’d deal with the problem.
Shortly after this, Feynman’s co-workers received a memorandum. The military solution?
“Has Richard Feynman been in your office at any time? If so, change the combination on your safe”.
While I am aware that different laws govern schools and public space in general, I think it’s worth remembering that what the kid did, was in fact quite legal. In his state, he is allowed to record conversations in which he participates without the concent of the other participants.
College students for years have been recording lectures rather than taking notes. (Whether that helps them is another story…) I can’t see any legitimate objection a teacher could have to this. If it bothers you you really should do some searching self-analysis to figure out why.
Unfortunately the teacher, David Paszkiewisz, did not get the message.
In a letter to the editor which was published in the newspaper ‘The Observer’, Paszkiewisz maintained that it was his constitutional right to preach to his students. In this letter he quote mines and misquotes some of the American founding fathers in an attempt to justify his actions.
He has so far displayed absolutely no repentance or remorse for what he did. Indeed he complained that his constitutional rights had been violated by being taken to task about the incident.
You can read his letter to the editor here.
http://forums.kearnyontheweb.com/index.php?s=fce96082d5e035810700bc044b649c78&showtopic=3727
It appears that the quotes he used in his letter are in some way related to a guy called David Barton, who runs a website called ‘WallBuilders’. David Barton is a Fundie whackjob, who is intent on destroying the 1st amendment and runs a national campaign of misinformation in an attempt to do so.
I’m a little late to the party here, but what strikes me is that the school thinks they can effectively ban such recorders. They’re practically daring the students to do it, and I’m fairly sure most would love the chance to out the next David Paszkiewicz.
this is all very sad… how disgraceful…
RE: Ichthyic
How can the chief of police be held responsible for the actions and performance of all of his officers if he doesn’t have a video camera installed in every police station at every work station?
Well, the system is different here. Schools are not responsible to a school board. They are responsible to the state. That is assuming they are public schools we are talking about.
And principals, head teachers and ancilliary staff have the freedom to wander around the classrooms at anytime they like. What they don’t have the freedom to do, is eavesdrop via the use of technology.
Gees, no wonder you guys didn’t kick up a stink about the Patriot Act, Big Brother was already alive and well.
Mike Fox I think is gone, but in case you are still here I will remind you that the kid DID complain to the authorities without the benefit of a recording, at first. The teacher denied–lied–about doing anything wrong. Perhaps, in his own mind, he wasn’t doing anything wrong, but the effect probably would have been the same: some kid known already known for making trouble (i.e. he had already made a statement about refusing to stand for the Pledge) is now accusing a well-liked, effective history teacher. Obviously there wouldn’t have been many other students to help him out in the case, by signing a petition or whatnot. By making the recording, he did what he felt he needed to do. We can quibble about the use of recorders in the classroom without permission, etc., but in this case I think we can give the kid the benefit of the doubt. He didn’t do anything that was against the rules (at the time, anyways).
For everybody else, I caught two things about this case (I don’t know if they were in the article mentioned by PZ, or if I found them in some of my other research):
1) Recording devices have not been completely banned. Rather, they are now only allowed to be used with permission of the teacher. Now, I understand that this may be effectively the same thing for teachers who have something to hide, but kids with disabilities and such should be fine.
2) I find it interesting that the administration considered the ban after certain students complained about hearing their voices posted on the internet, the six o’ clock news, etc. So…should there be legitimate concerns about the “privacy” of students while in a classroom setting (after all, I don’t think any of them were actually identified)? Is it possible some of these students were those critical of the whistleblower’s actions? There’s no way to know for sure, I suppose, but it’s interesting food for thought….
[q]do you really care if a high school student post a video of you picking your nose?
obviously a ridiculous example, but the only real way to deal with the issue is to have a bit of self-confidence yourself, and laugh at the little stuff.[/q]
No, of course not. Yes, this was an obviously rediculous example. No, I don’t take anything my kids do personally. If I did and if this were an insecurity issue, I wouldn’t have made it through my first semester as a teacher and I wouldn’t be commenting now. Stepping into a high school classroom as a teacher on a daily basis is an exercise in self confidence and self control.
No, when it comes to the issue of what is responsible or irresponsible teenage behavior at a high school, I’m glad to say that we do have more options than “Have a little more self confidence”. I could give you some actual examples of what kids at my school have been caught videotaping with just their cellphones, inside and outside the classroom but I hope you get the point. In my district, the overwhelming response to the issue of personal electronics is to ban them. The kid needs to show, first, that he/she can be a responsible individual before being allowed to use such equipment. Many do, which is why we have a film making class, film club, etc.
“College students for years have been recording lectures rather than taking notes. (Whether that helps them is another story…) I can’t see any legitimate objection a teacher could have to this. If it bothers you you really should do some searching self-analysis to figure out why.”
Yes, college kids have been doing this for years. I was one of those kids as were most of the people who post here i imagine. I don’t have any objections to that although I can’t say if faculty at a college have the right to ban such devices if they don’t like it.
However, we are talking about high school and high school kids. Before we start talking about seeking professional help regarding insecurity issues, I think we need to sit down and do a compare/contrast between the responsibility level of the average high school kid and average college kid.
Sorry, I still don’t get it. You’re conducting a class in front of 30 some odd witnesses, in a public institution. I don’t get what’s so addionally threatening about being recorded. If you were ever accused of doing something inappropriate in class, it could even be to your advantage if recordings existed. I’m certainly willing to consider that there may be concerns I haven’t thought of, but the trouble is, nobody in this thread has as yet explained what those might be, they’ve just stated their discomfort without making any real attmept to defend it. If you’d like to expand on your objections I’m certainly prepared to listen sympathetically and I’m open to persuasion.
“While I am aware that different laws govern schools and public space in general, I think it’s worth remembering that what the kid did, was in fact quite legal. In his state, he is allowed to record conversations in which he participates without the concent of the other participants.”
Agreed. Certainly, I’m not arguing that this kid in this situation did the wrong thing. Even if recording devices had been banned in his school, I’d even argue that his kid showed an unusual level of responsibility given the situation. Still, I’m not surprised that the decision was made to ban future use of such devices given the vast number of other situations that may arise becuase of the use of such devices.
I don’t necessarily see this response as support of Creationism in the classroom, although it certainly could be. Call me naive, but my first impulse is to picture parents and teachers and administrators realizing that, “What, kids are bringing recording devices into the classroom? Umm.”
so, have you offered the student involved here, David LeClair, a full scholarship to UMM? Kudos to him for standing up and protesting and for collecting empirical evidence to back him up. We need more
kidspeople like him.The Kearney school board’s reaction is pathetically dense: “Let’s make ourselves a laughing-stock, shall we?” The teacher. Paszkiewicz, has proven himself to be an immoral liar. Any punishment should fall on him.
In Canada, if one party to a transaction knows it’s being recorded, then it’s legal to record.
Besides, tape recorders are so obsolete. I have a digital voice recorder about the size of four cigarettes that can be set on voice-activated meeting mode and record ninety minutes of dialogue. They didn’t ban DVRs, did they? And then there are cameras with audiovisual recording mode. Jerks.
It would be so much more refreshing if the schoolboard mandated A/V recordings of all class time.
Well, it’s obvious they have found the source of the problem- and it’s not those
lunaticwonderful teachers, but the deviant, evil students who would dare call them out.Hooray for Freedom, Justice, and the Mmerikkkan way.
Why do you hate America?
Steve,
Ok, forget for a moment that the opinion of a classroom teacher regarding what is or is not appropriate in his/her classroom even means anything to anybody.
Read through the posts and you’ll find this:
“And why do I feel that such devices should not be in the classroom? It is not because teachers have a right to privacy while they are teaching. It is because students have a right to privacy when they are in a location that is legally mandated for them to be in (public but not optional).”
If I believed that every recording device ever smuggled into my room was going to be trained on me, that would be one thing. If however, a student decides to record the activities of another student surreptiously or even openly, then that can become a legal issue for the school, district, and teacher. The law is very specific regarding the right to safe classroom environment in every school district. Please, I don’t find it particularly comfortable talking about what kids at my school have been caught recording inside and outside the classroom but suffice it to say that it happens and I doubt that parents of recorded kids would be as understanding or have the same sense of humor that teachers are obviously expected to have.
Vandalhooch,
Thanks and most definitely in agreement with this particular case. But as a high school techer, I would laugh openly at the thought of cutting teenagers loose on a high school campus with recording devices if I didn’t have to actually deal with the consequences on a weekly basis even with protocols in place.
I’m rather surprised at the comment about college kids recording classes. No one does that anymore because an official recording is made for them and is made available to them via the internet. You are describing a practice from the 1980s. Oh, and no one would ever record a tutorial, as a opposed to a lecture. A tutorial is a place where students are encouraged to speak freely on the basis that no questions or comments will be considered stupid, or used against them outside the class (as long as nothing actually unlawful is said, but no one is going to record tutorials on the off-chance of that happening).
I have no particular comment to make about secondary school teaching, though what FHS says makes sense to me.
Back to the topic of this particular teacher. In the particular circumstances of the case, the kid did the right thing and the teacher should certainly be sacked.
Apparently you’re describing some university with a wealth of resources such as I’ve never seen. At the two universities where I’ve taught in the past several years (one public, one private), only a handful of courses are recorded. Mine have never been.
I’m describing Monash University, but I’m pretty sure that all the major universities in Australia do what I described. I’d be amazed if it were otherwise in major US universities, which have resources that teachers at places like Monash can only dream of. However, I’ve been amazed before by cultural diffeences between Australia and the US. My real point is that the comments about students bringing in tape recorders don’t generalise.
Official recordings of all classes??? We don’t even have permanently installed LCD projectors in well over half of our classrooms, have to beg the instructional resources department to borrow portable VCRs and DVD players on carts, and none of the DVD players have remotes so we can’t actually page around in the menus. Oh, and more often than not, when we bring in our own laptops to show PowerPoint or whatnot, the jack in the wall of the classes that do have installed projectors turns out to not be active. Whatever resources you have at your college, they far outpace mine, at least.
Well, frankly, I think we sometimes overdo the emphasis on technology here. There can be a pressure to use it when it’s not particularly appropriate – though I should add that taping of lectures is not compulsory. It’s the choice of the lecturer whether to use the taping system, though in my experience almost everyone does. Also, bear in mind that a lot of classes are quite small and are taught as seminars or tutorials rather than as lectures, but then again it would be unusual for students to want to tape those sorts of classes. At least in my experience.
But my point is just that we shouldn’t be drawing too many firm conclusions about what is good teaching practice from what students do in some places and times.
On a general question of what is good teaching practice in secondary schools, I would rather defer to the views of secondary school teachers, and I think we might get a range of reasonable opinions from them – in which case I’d conclude that there’s a variety of legitimate approaches.
We can acknowledge that while also being suitably angry (as I am) at the protective treatment being accorded David Paszkiewicz.
Well, the system is different here. Schools are not responsible to a school board. They are responsible to the state. That is assuming they are public schools we are talking about.
I’ll leave off on your “big brother” comment, which was needlessly irrelevant, and instead ask:
How do Australian schools deal with standards, and enforcement of standards?
Carlie: I did something smaller scale but similar when my HS made an abysmal decision about security software – which probably was necessary, but they chose an absolutely craptacular product. I remember Macuser or Macworld basically said the only merit of the product was price. So I found a way around it after telling the people in charge that I would do so to show how bad the program was and was nearly punished after doing it. (Oh yeah, they didn’t threaten me with punishment in advance, just laugh off the idea that it was breakable.) Fortunately cooler heads prevailed.
I might add the experience did teach me one or two things very interesting and poorly understood about the pre-X MacOS, though, so it did contribute to my education.
Steve LaBonne: I noticed while a student that students who were ESL were more inclined to use tape recorders. (At McGill the students had to get permission from the instructors to do so, too. Mind you, McGill also has NTCs …)