Have you googled your teacher lately?

I have the awesome privilege of being the only Alison Prehn on the internet. Therefore, everything I’ve ever done that’s ever been posted online is there when I search myself in google and pipl. The majority of the stuff is sports related. Most of it is marathons and other fun runs I’ve been in, followed by college sports and then high school sports. The most interesting thing I found is an essay I wrote in high school that I won an award for. http://www.hennet.org/contest.php. However, there’s not actually a link to it on the internet. Apparently it was too long ago, before they actually posted stuff like that on the internet. Overall I didn’t find anything embarrassing, thank god. So far there’s nothing I really want to change, except that I’ll probably need to clean up my Facebook and MySpace pages some.
I think teachers should use discretion when it comes to what they do in their personal lives. Yes, I think they should be able to do whatever they want, as long as it’s legal, but they need to be smart about it. For example, teachers should be able to drink in public, as long as they abide by the law. This means not driving and not disturbing the peace. Also, if teachers are going to get really wild, it’s probably best they do it in their own homes, or somewhere far away from the school they work in. In the way they conduct themselves, teachers need to be careful, and not openly act in a way that might be suggestive or irresponsible. Chances are the more a teacher uses discretion as to where or when he or she posts things or acts a certain way, the less opportunity a community member has of noticing. Furthermore, no rational person should report a teacher after one incident of questionable behavior outside of the school, provided it is not illegal. However, we cannot predict what any one member of the community might decide to report, which makes things tough.
If a teacher is going to say something that is inappropriate or in bad taste, they should probably not do it on the internet. These kinds of comments should be reserved for close family or friends. If a teacher uses basic moral judgment they will not find themselves in any risky situations in the first place.
The most interesting thing in the article “Have you googled your teacher lately?” was the quote, “The landmark Supreme Court decision in Tinker v. Des Moines asserted that students and teachers do not 'shed their constitutional rights... at the schoolhouse gate.’” I didn’t know there was an actual court case stating that fact. However, this case should not give teacher a false sense of security in exercising their constitutional rights.
Personally, I am going to be extremely careful about what gets posted about me on the internet. I can control this most readily through Facebook and MySpace. I will also, when in public, act in such a way that appears in control and responsible. Mostly I would never want my students to feel that they could act a certain way because I was seen acting that way. What’s appropriate for a 30-something woman and teenagers is obviously completely different. I think if I act in ways I should anyway, as a morally sound person, I will never run into problems.