DOPA Implications for School Libraries July 28, 2006
Posted by sbrisco in : Community , 2 commentsYALSA executive director Beth Yoke announced Wednesday the importance of contacting our US House Representatives asking them to oppose H.R. 5319 DOPA (Deleting Online Predators Act). Within the past two days, she has also announced the ‘fast-track’ pace of the US Senate to move the bill forward.
What does DOPA mean to the school library? First of all, it would require that, as a condition of receiving E-Rate support, all schools and libraries block access to social networking websites and chat rooms. The ALA website sheds some implications to the school library such as:
1) Local school districts and libraries should determine what content should flow into schools and libraries. Federal mandate over content control is very problematic.
2) Districts and libraries already have the power to block access to social networking sites and chat rooms and a number of them have already done so.
3) DOPA imposes yet another burden on schools and libraries participating in the E-rate and may deter many from continuing to participate.
4) This bill paints an unflattering and distorted view of the Internet as a whole, serving to scare away parents, students, teachers and librarians from making use of all its resources.
In an election year we understand the seriousness of instant legislation created to gain immediate political support; however, the implications of DOPA would critically censor access to many social networks (communication) used within education by not just students, but also teachers, parents, and librarians.
Beth Yoke’s testimony before Congress shows examples of how students safely use online communities and social networking to take virtual field trips, participate in distance education courses, and provide disabled students with the opportunity to “physically” participate with their peers in a virtual environment that does not discriminate or exclude. Her statements, however, may have been in vain.
As we watch for next week’s move on DOPA by the Senate, it is IMPORTANT that school librarians help to educate others (including our legislators, administrators, parents, and teachers) of the implications of federal restrictions on the social networking. While we all want to provide Internet safety for our children, we should remember that restricting Internet access does not protect our children from ALL evils that lurk within our much smaller technological world.
Rather than restricting social networking, communications, and real-time connections with one another through the Internet, it our responsibility to teach students (and those who do not understand the educational opportunities in social networking) how to protect themselves, how to make good choices, and how to evaluate information, individuals, and ideas online. These are local responsibilities, not federal responsibilities.
To stay up-to-date on what’s happening, check the ALA Legislative Action Center and be sure to stay connected next week to read how to take immediate action. The ALA office will have a Legislative Advocacy Guide that will make contacting your Senator’s office easy, as well as a Social Networking Site Toolkit so you can help educate your coworkers and library users about the pros and cons of social networking sites, what DOPA may mean for them and how to stay safe on the Internet.
NECC - the exhibit floor July 12, 2006
Posted by Debbie Stafford in : NECC2006 , add a commentA big part of NECC (and ALA) is the exhibit floor. Wandering through the area lets you see so many vendors all in one place. Collecting free goodies is always fun. I like to use these freebies as give aways during professional development back at my school.
This year there was the usual variety of vendors some who have been around for a good while such as Adobe, Apple, Scholastic but some new ones as well. Many of the vendors give mini workshops at their booth and these are often as good as or better than the other workshops.
In terms of Libraries, only some of the exhibits pertained solely to libraries. There were a few library automation vendors, and a very few database providers (the main one I saw was Gale). In terms of equipment I saw nothing specific to libraries. I would like to see some new products for barcode scanners. But I saw nothing here and do not remember seeing anything at AASL in October.
There were lots of vendors offering school management programs, and those instant feedback programs which use a small clicker device. Internet safety, online courses and tutorials were also there. But I didn’t see anything really new in these areas.
Many of the booths that I spent time in offered free content, for example NASA and Library of Congress.
I would be interested to hear what others thought of the vendor exhibit.
Tag: NECC2006
Adobe Breakfast July 11, 2006
Posted by lrjohnson in : NECC2006 , add a commentNo conference is complete without going to presentations by vendors. It is a great opportunity to help out on the food budget and at the same time network with your table. I wasn’t sure what to expect since I had attended the Adobe presentation at FETC but they did it right this time!
Three different educators shared what they were using Adobe for. I need to follow up with Adobe Breeze. You first put together a PowerPoint presentation and then put it in Adobe Breeze. This allows you to take PowerPoint up to another level and include handouts for tutorials or assignments.
A media specialist from Florida gave a great presentation on how she uses Adobe Photoshop with the students for visual literacy projects. Students worked together to create the images that would tell the story. With the students creating their own book covers using the program the potential for sharing book hooks is tremendous. Half of the screen is an intro to the book and the other half the cover they created. Gave me lots of ideas and she will be presenting at FAME in November!
The last one was a film and design class from Bellarmine HS. Unfortunately I did not catch where they were from and thinking it was a unique name I planned to go on their web page but there are a lot of Bellarmine High Schools! The teacher showed the awesome projects the students did for their film and design class with the purpose to taek them from Academic to Industry. They actually did designs for companies. With the expanded venue for viewing the students took great pride in their work and it showed in all their products. They did logos, CD covers, posters, trailers…
Keynote: DeWitt Jones
Posted by lrjohnson in : NECC2006 , add a commentImmediately get the video online of his presentation. The web site is http://www.DewittJones.com The beauty of his photography behind him as he presented was awesome! What he had to say was very inspiring. Before he spoke they used Turning Point, an immediate response system that polled the audience on what we thought was needed for the transformation of education to meet the needs of the digital generation and almost half said Visionary Leadership.
Jones was a great follow up for that! He spoke of having a vision, passion, creativity and a dream. He himself read National Geographic by flashlight as a kid. He had a dream and he persisted in spite of the family push for business through acceptance at Harvard. He spoke of National Geographic’s passion for sharing what is right with the world. (Don’t we need to change our focus in the news?) He spoke of hearing Robert Frost’s poems and the impact the words had on him.
One thing that really hit home was discipline and commitment are non-issues when you have passion. He spoke of the view we have, is it seeing the possibilities? The stone chipper vs the cathedral builder?
He talked about in photography there is more than one right answer. Nature is beauty and possibility. We need to be willing to take a risk. Open ourselves to the possibilities and remember that is is not what will I take but what will I be given.
Celebrate our journey in life with gratitude and grace. He ended it with know our purpose, have passion, vision and values!
What a perfect opening session!
Beyond Acceptable Use: Developing and Implementing a Plagiarism Policy July 10, 2006
Posted by Debbie Stafford in : NECC2006 , add a commentPresented by Debbie Abilock (editor of AASL’s Knowledge Quest).
Much of the information can be found on her site at www.noodletools.com/debbie/ethical Checking in here will give you a better outline than I can give here form my notes. Beyond Acceptable Use: Ethical and Academic Use (.pdf)
Debbie focused on reasons why students plagiarize and why having an acceptable use policy is not enough. The most interesting thought, “it is not enough to “tweak the assignment”. Many of us tell teachers that they need to make the assignments more interesting or more difficult for students to copy/paste. However, if the pressure for a student to succeed academically, then even really interesting compelling projects may still be plagiarized.
Several resources mentioned during the session; film “Shattered Glass” book “Doing School” Yale University Press, author Geoffrey Nunberg “power of blog culture to credit.
Resources which help students with creating bibliographic citations and note taking were also discussed. Along this line, Noodletools will soon have a note-taking component.
Tag: NECC2006