Students use Facebook to oust teacher’s blog
March 6, 2011 by Claire KnightPosted in: Free Speech, In this week's e-newsletter, Latest News & Views
After finding their teacher’s blog, these students were appalled. So they did what they always do — they put it on Facebook.
Students at Central Bucks East High School posted links to teacher Natalie Monroe’s blog on Facebook, where it went viral to a much wider audience.
That’s when school officials were bombarded with complaints from parents and students who called to “express shock, outrage, disappointment, disgust, [and] anger.”
The blog, called “Where are we going, and why are we in this handbasket?” had several questionable comments about students and co-workers. One post revealed what she really wanted to say to parents:
- “Concerned your kid is automaton, as she just sits there emotionless for an entire 90 minutes, staring into the abyss, never volunteering to speak or do anything.”
- “Too smart for her own good and refuses to play the school ‘game’ such that she’ll never live up to her true potential here.”
- “A complete and utter jerk in all ways. Although academically OK, your child had no other redeeming qualities.”
- “Just as bad as his sibling. Don’t you know how to raise kids?”
- “Shy isn’t cute in 11th grade; it’s annoying. Must learn to advocate for himself instead of having Mommy do it.”
- “Seems smarter than she actually is.”
When students found the blog, they posted links on Facebook and the teacher’s rant was quickly circulated to parents and students.
When school officials learned about the blog, they took immediate action, including:
- calling in a substitute teacher
- removing Monroe from the building
- suspending Monroe, pending the results of an investigation
- talking to teachers about the use of social media
- reviewing the school district’s policies, and
- cooperating with the school board’s investigation.
What do you think of this teacher’s blog — and the school’s response? Chime in below.
Tags: blogs, electronic communication, Facebook, social media gaffes
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March 4th, 2011 at 3:30 pm
If she’s not naming names (and posting during worktime), let the woman relieve some steam. She has the right to free speech, just the same as anyone else. Trust me, there are plenty of us, on a daily basis, putting up with the behavior of these lovely darlings – we mask it during the day and need to be able to share our experiences.
March 4th, 2011 at 3:46 pm
I would prefer to hear the truth about my child’s work, potential and effort. Not in a blog (especially if the person is named) but in a one-on-one talk or if need be an email. The platitudes or silence are not helpful.
March 4th, 2011 at 4:09 pm
I agree with kymagirl – she didn’t do anything wrong and shouldn’t be punished. What sort of message is it communicating to these students to have her removed? That anyone who says something you disagree with can be bullied and removed? Disgusting.
March 4th, 2011 at 4:18 pm
One reason I never seriously considered becoming a teacher was that I really didn’t like a lot of other people’s children, and teachers must be able to do that. Kids are deliberately mentally cruel to their teachers, and the teachers really have no recourse. The blog was inappropriate, but the teachers really need an outlet for the kind of frustration this teacher displayed.
March 4th, 2011 at 4:25 pm
I agree with kymagirl- if she’s not giving out enough information for the students to be identified (although she should DEFINITELY not post anything that would give her school away!), she should have the right to post what she wants. NO parent of a “special snowflake” wants to hear the “truth” about their child; that’s why the kid is the way they are in the first place. There are parents who do not feel the need to parent their child even when they ARE told that their child is “not working up to potential,” “wasting time in class,” “missing assignments,” or “disrupting others.”
March 4th, 2011 at 4:52 pm
Folks, I agree with some of your concerns on teachers being able to relieve themselves, but I have to say a public forum is not a place to relieve your stress. If a teacher feels strongly that this is their one and only option, I would suggest utilizing the privacy settings feature with FACEBOOK to prevent students from finding them.
March 4th, 2011 at 4:52 pm
As the old addage says, sometimes the truth hurts. Any of these teacher’s comments could have come from any teacher who’s been in the classroom more than a year, and especially those who have been here longer. “…[S]hock, outrage, disappointment, disgust, [and] anger.” You can’t be serious. If there’s any shock to be had, it has to be that these parents still don’t understand that their children are NOT god’s gift to humanity. Poor judgment on the teacher’s part for making herself so identifiable, but honestly, this is not a punishable offense.
March 4th, 2011 at 4:55 pm
I agree with Library Lady; you have to like kids to be a teacher. Frankly, if you don’t, you’re not a good teacher. If the information, that is dying to get released due to all this new information technology, forces the hands of admnistrators to face the uncomfortable situation of uncaring educators, so be it. Good for the students to advocate for themselves. Yes, teachers should have the freedom to speak their mind, but if their choice to voice their opinion iluminates a character trait unfavorable to a school’s climate and culture, then they need to reap that reward.
March 4th, 2011 at 4:55 pm
“these students were appalled,” I read *expression of mock horror*
Put a link on Facebook! *giggle, giggle*
Getting an overreaction from the administration is never useful. I’m sure the parents could easily recognize their children in her post. I’ve had conferences with teachers about my underachieving son that were equally frank, but less humorous.
Parents, take a chill pill. On the other hand, we could pillory the witch.
March 4th, 2011 at 4:56 pm
If the students can’t be individually identified, she’s done nothing wrong IMO. Having her removed is bullying by the students. That said, if all she does is complain, she might want to consider a different line of work.
March 4th, 2011 at 5:01 pm
Don’t use your real name if you are going to trash where you work on line.
March 4th, 2011 at 5:04 pm
Someone should blog about her intelligence. Why would you post anything on the web that could get you fired. There are hundreds of stories out there about employers using facebook to hire and fire staff. We all need ways to vent… but people should realize that what you put on the web is out there and once it’s out there you have no control over it….
March 4th, 2011 at 5:09 pm
What the instructor did was silly knowing the transparency of the internet. I would suggest a hand written diary in the future . However what the students did is more insidious. Once again we have empowered and rewarded students for the simple fact that they are more technolocally saavy than their teacher in this case. It should be illegal to re publish something that was intended to be private . Who determines privacy or what is morally right here? What is the message that the students learn from this ? Nothing is sacred and there is no empathy or understanding. Or if it is juicy and they dont like what they see or hear lets get the mob to judge . I hope it happens to the kids who re -posted . Let he who is without sin make the first post.
Have a great future kiddies!!
March 4th, 2011 at 5:10 pm
Before I forget . . . what got me reading this was the appalling use of the word “oust” in the headline! Were you thinking of the word “outing?” It makes no sense.
March 4th, 2011 at 5:11 pm
The students in Australia actually applauded this message on their school answering machine.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MdBqJ3_ox0
This instructor has done nothing wrong. Is there any free speech left in America?
March 4th, 2011 at 5:12 pm
We have a First Amendment right to freedom of speech in this country. These kids stalked this teacher online, found her blog, outed her, turned her in and got her in serious trouble. What lesson did the children learn from this?
March 4th, 2011 at 5:17 pm
So . . . it’s perfectly okay for students to blast their professors online BY NAME (as in “Ratemyprofessor.com”)–but Facebook venting by a teacher about anonymous miscreants
gets her punished. What’s wrong with this picture? And P.S. is it any wonder US education
has gone down the tubes?
March 4th, 2011 at 5:24 pm
The school district suggests wrongdoing, how would you say the aforementioned comments that would be acceptable to district? Something should be said to child/parent/etc. in many of these comments, so how would “You” say it?
March 4th, 2011 at 5:38 pm
I’m with IG – nobody should be using facebook who doesn’t know how to use privacy settings. And if she really intended to make her words available to the whole world, then she should have considered that her students and their parents are part of that world! A motto we should all live with – “Never put anything in writing (which includes posts, blogs, and tweets) that you wouldn’t want to have read aloud on the evening news.”
Still – as long as the information was truly not identifiable with individual students (if people reading it couldn’t figure out who she was talking about unless they already knew), and if she wasn’t posting on school equipment or during her work day, then the First Amendment should apply.
March 4th, 2011 at 5:40 pm
Unprofessional and unacceptable behavior for a teacher. Yes, we all have those moments of frustration, but a public blog is not an appropriate outlet for that frustration. What are we teaching children by writing such hateful things? We do need to communicate social, academic, and behavior problems frankly to parents, but it needs to be done confidentially and with compassion. If you can’t do that you should not be a teacher.
March 4th, 2011 at 5:52 pm
I agree with Roberta. Students anonymously blast teachers on ratemyteacher.com, calling them creepy, terrible, too easy, too difficult, etc. Frankly, with my state government voting on merit-based pay in a couple weeks, I fear these types of comments might be used by administrators to judge teacher performance. Scary times. A kid could get a bad grade and take it out on the teacher anonymously.
March 4th, 2011 at 5:54 pm
It is interesting that a teacher is beign questioned on venting on her personal facebook page (without naming names) but a student can go on a rant on “rate my professor” with the full name of the teacher listed. Do teachers have any say??
March 4th, 2011 at 5:57 pm
If wing nut protesters wave hate speech at a Military Funeral and they are upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court as practicing “Free Speech,” the School district is way out of line here and over reacted.
Stalking off or on line should not be approved.
As long as the teacher is not naming names or posting from work she isn’t wrong here in any way.
It has everything to do with Constitutional rights and nothing to do with her professionalism.
All in all she posted pretty mild critiques.
Indeed it seems quite a few people need to take a “chill pill.”
March 4th, 2011 at 6:04 pm
I think that the teacher experienced what we call the “teachable moment.” We have warned students frequently to monitor what they post on their Facebook sites and their blogs. Guess what? Teachers — and all other professionals — are in the exact same situation. It is not stalking to read someone’s blog. That’s what it is there for. As a parent and an eductor, this teacher deserves to be fired for her cynical attitudes toward students. How does anonymous ranting help anyone? No student can recognize himself or herself and change. Yes, the teacher may say whatever she wants on Facebook. She has freedom of expression. No one will take her to jail, but people can be — and have been — fired for making inappropriate comments about supervisors and co-workers on Facebook. Welcome to the real world.
March 4th, 2011 at 6:12 pm
If the references to students do not identify them specifically, as others have stated above, the school and parents overreacted. It seems she hit a nerve with this blog or else people wouldn’t be so defensive. She is making some observations about students in her class which concern her. Why aren’t parents more concerned about addressing in their children what she is saying, instead of assuming she is picking on their kids? She spends hours a day with the students, more than most parents spend with their kids, so she has a perspective administration and parents don’t have. This should be a wake-up call for parents that their children aren’t perfect and they shouldn’t blame the teachers for that.
March 4th, 2011 at 6:29 pm
Before I make judgment, I’d want to see the quoted text in context.
March 4th, 2011 at 6:34 pm
I admire Ms. Natalie Monroe for her courage to talk straight to parents on a public forum. While so many teachers and administrators are too afraid to speak up the ‘truth’ about many students, she seems to be sending a serious message to parents who would say, ‘My children would never do such a thing.’ She does not sound like venting her frustration at all. I sense that she is very concerned about the current sad state of affairs in education. I used to post a message outside my office, which read, “Young people, leave home while you know everything.” It was removed every time I put it up. Obviously, truth hurts. I can see something similar in students’, parents’ and administrators’ reactions. I do not hold parents 100% responsible for the behaviour of their children, however.
March 4th, 2011 at 6:41 pm
I agree with Johnny K and Kelly. Many of you are getting it wrong. The teacher did not post it to Facebook, the students did. She wrote a blog on the web which is admittedly public domain, BUT the students had to be searching the web for her name in order for them to find her blog and then re-post it to their own Facebook pages. Why were they doing that? Students make fun of teachers on their social media all the time. As someone else said, teachers and professors are routinely ridiculed by name on RateMyProfessor and other similar sites. It’s no secret that adolescents are not emotionally mature and their determination to embarrass the teacher in a public way is equally reprehensible to anything she might have said without naming names.
March 4th, 2011 at 6:49 pm
“Oust a teacher’s blog”? Oust? Really? Who writes this garbage?
March 4th, 2011 at 6:59 pm
Funny how some of the issues surrounding this case are not interpreted correctly. Here’s my take on this as someone who teaches both teachers and students how to blog:
1. The teacher posted her comments publicly on her blog. Not in Facebook. As a blogger, she (and everyone else) has the option to make both the blog and the posts public or private. She choose public.
2. The students googled their teacher (a common practice these days) and found it. They did not stalk her. She choose to put her thoughts out there for the world to see.
3. The students were ‘upset’ about it, but not upset enough that they did not want other people to find those comments. They choose to post it to their Facebook audience.
4. The district decided to take action against the teacher. The teacher may have a free speech legal case only if she never signed, or was informed, that her behavior in the public arena (in real world spaces and in online spaces) is a reflection on the employer. The employer has a right to limit the actions of its employees outside the workplace, even if it impedes on free speech rights. After all, you can choose not to work there, but if you do you are agreeing to the work terms.
5. The teacher needed to vent, but made a poor decision in her method for venting. Same would be true if she went to a public sporting event, stood up and shouted those same comments to the entire arena. Bad choice. It lives forever online now.
6. We need to teach both teachers and students how to behave online and create a positive digital footprint. Both sides are not adding anything positive to their digital footprints in this case. If those students publicly bash their teachers online, a prospective college or employer may find that as well. Obviously, this teacher will now have a difficult time remaining a teacher.
The teacher has done something wrong; she made a series of bad decisions. The students have done something wrong; they pretended to be appalled, but they helped to spread the message around to provide backlash against the teacher. The district did something wrong because it took the knee-jerk over reaction of removal of the person, not the content. They should educate the teacher and tell her to post privately or keep those thoughts in the pen/paper world. However, without seeing and reading her blog we don’t actually know if she hates all students or just some. Has she posted anything positive about her students online? If not, she’s not really cut out to be a teacher.
March 4th, 2011 at 7:05 pm
This is not necessarily a free speech case if the teacher signed a contract or letter of intent that prohibts such public ‘venting’. I’ve signed them in the past and mine specifically stated I will not take to a public forum, in any sense, to say anything disparaging or degrading about my students, employer, or parents. I agreed to that, so if I posted the types of rants she did to my blog, I’d be disciplined by my employer.
March 4th, 2011 at 7:06 pm
Isn’t this how the movie Social Networking started? Some geeky college kid loses an argument with his dreamgirl and then types the ultimate negative blog about her. Then, still upset by the estrangement of his dreamgirl, he invents Face Mash to get back at all the girls on campus. Face Mash gets him in trouble with the University and all the girls there. However, the result of all of this was . . . you guessed it . . . FaceBook!
So, I am wondering if all this blog nonesense is just childish high school gossip. Someone gets mad at someone or something and blah blahs their useless thoughts on the web for everyone to see and then they wonder why everyone gets mad at them.
I am thinking free speech is a good thing and blogs represent free speech so blogs are a good thing. However if you are going to speak to the whole world, don’t you want to say something meaningful?
March 4th, 2011 at 7:26 pm
As long as no students were singled out with names or identifiable details, I have no problem with this. Teaching is a thankless, stressful, maddening, exhausting job, and sometimes you have to vent.
March 4th, 2011 at 7:45 pm
Facebook, I love it and hate it at the same time. So she vented, blogged what she would truly love to say out loud, unfortunately, blogging it is the same thing. She still posted it in a public forum where sure enough some crybaby was gonna find it and and go running to tell. As was stated in a previous comment, she apparently touched a nerve.
I’m a parent, so no I would not appreciate one of my child’s teachers posting those comments. BUT be realistic, I was also someone’s student too. Comments like “my child isn’t like that or would never behave that way” is ridiculous statement to make. We all hope our children remain our little angles when they leave the house and go to school, but they don’t.
Personally, I feel that the parents and the school overreacted. What she said in her blog is not what she is teaching in class. Student’s complain all day, my teacher sucks, she’s rude and they post these comments on Facebook too. Should these student’s now have action taken against them? They’ve offended their instructor who happened to see it.
These petty issues are the things that make it hard for a teacher to teach, their hands get tied left and right. Its bad enough that instead of a good well rounded education that prepares them for college should they want to pursue more education or on to the workforce, they instead learn a test, because that’s what the school is graded on, not a good education, a test. I know I’m straddling two soap boxes right now but at what point do we allow the teachers to teach and not nitpick at every little thing that offends someone?
March 4th, 2011 at 7:52 pm
If the teacher had published an essay in a magazine or a short story in a literary journal saying the same things, it woud not have caused the same ferenzy–the post literate students and parents would probably never even have found it. The media love to cover new media & tech in a sensationalized way, and media coverage played a part in the reaction to the teacher’s blog–and continues to as this long set of replies demonstrates. Should the teacher have known better than to say these things in a publically accessible forum? Arguably. Should I have known better than to have ice cream after lunch today, given that I have elevated cholesterol? Definitely. But the teacher actually caused less real harm than I did, and in either case the moral guardians should mind their own business. She is really being penalized just for being naive,
March 4th, 2011 at 8:09 pm
There seems to be a strong thread of agreement. Was what she said something any of us might say about an anonymous student at some point or another? However, there is a big lesson that, hopefully, we as parents are teaching our children and that is “what you put out there in print (blog/facebook/text/email/a hand-written note), is out there for the world to read,” so use caution. (Or, perhaps that was her intent.) But, like others have stated, students are allowed to say anything that they want about us on ratemyprofessor.com and, even if it is a blatant lie or just misleading or one-sided (they decided not to do any of the homework by the due dates and are angry that their late work wasn’t allowed), what is our recourse or their punishment? I love the post that noted and . These students are being rewarded. Perhaps a stern talk from the principal about what would be appropriate use of public media in regards to what she says, remembering her First Amendment rights if she didn’t sign those away, but also reminding her of good old-fashioned common sense, might be in order. And, if she really doesn’t like kids, she might need to find a different career option or take up Yoga or something. But, she could just be having one of those semesters or years where it is just a tough group of kids and is just trying to get to the end of her time with them. Unfortunately, the whole situation started with a “wrong” or at least questionable act and then every subsequent act continued down that path. Perhaps we should follow the wise advice of “If ya can’t say nothin nice, don’t say anything at all.”
March 4th, 2011 at 8:53 pm
I have been dismayed at the immature, selfish, irresponsible way some of the students in my school have behaved and how their parents defend those actions and even lie for the kids so those kids avoid consequences. I thought my disillusionment may have come from burn-out, as I have 29 years in the public school system. When I read that blogging teacher’s comments and found out that she was just 30 years old, I felt a bit vindicated. The behavior of the students in our two affluent school districts (my sister lives in that district) is similarly appalling, but with my extra two decades of experience comes the wisdom to not vent about it in a public forum.
March 4th, 2011 at 9:12 pm
Was it her right to say what she thought? Yes. Was it smart? No. There is no such thing as a anonymous blog unless you write under a total pseudonym without your picture. I just saw the interview of her on Good Morning America. DUH!!!
March 4th, 2011 at 9:16 pm
Why does a person have to tweet, blog, or facebook every private thought/vent? Whatever happened to keeping a private journal or talking with colleague or friend?
March 4th, 2011 at 9:42 pm
@Michael: funny how you, too, found it necessary to put your thoughts out here in cyberspace via the comments on this post. You see the irony in your statement, right?
What many of you miss here is that what this teacher did was not professional. Sure, she can post anything she wants, but it ultimately hurts her credibility and her standing as an educator. What she did was the equivalent of graffiti, except she tied her name to it. I will still assume she signed a contract that forbid this type of public venting. That does limit her free speech. Employers can do that you know. She made a really bad decision and now she is (and will continue to) pay the price. As a principal, would you want to hire her? If a business vented online about their customers this way, would you want to visit and promote that business.
@Another Prof and @Linguist: both comments are well stated
March 4th, 2011 at 10:18 pm
Regarding all the references to freedom of speech and the First Amendment, I was taught that these meant you cannot be stopped from saying something, but that you are still accountable for what you say. We all know there are laws providing doctor patient confidentiality, recently ones that will cause fire to reign down on a dentist that tells a patient’s spouse if he has an appointment. Similarly, there are also laws protecting teacher-student/guardian confidentiality. In education, this law is FERPA. Without referring to students by name, this teacher may not have violated the letter. However, she should certainly have known that there are a lot of things about her job that shall not be shared in any non-academic forum without suffering the consequences.
March 4th, 2011 at 10:41 pm
As a computer professor, I worry about students posting a false blog, page, whatever, with my name attached as author. Any of them could, and with the variety of free sites available, it would be impossible for me to deny that it was my own work. If a student wants to get a teacher fired, it has become way too easy with cases such as this happening.
In this case, it is implied that the teacher admitted to the blog being hers, but what if she hadn’t?
March 5th, 2011 at 1:29 am
Freedom of speech.
March 5th, 2011 at 4:07 pm
Being an educator, it is easy to side with the teacher due to the shared frustrations we all face in our classrooms. However, we do face those frustrations at work in the process of doing our jobs. There is absolutely no justification for sharing student information in a public forum. Regardless of the massive harm it can do to the students, the institution and your own career, it is ethically wrong. If you are at the point where you feel compelled to vent, do it privately and seek the help you need to overcome the frustrations.
To those who think nameless comments are OK, whether the students know exactly or are guessing who you are commenting on doesn’t matter. They will be adversely affected.
To those who say students post worse on ratemyprofessor, those are minors with no obligations to their instructors. Instructors have a fiduciary obligation not to disseminate information about the students in their charge.
March 5th, 2011 at 5:19 pm
Three cheers for teachers like her who have the guts to tell it like it is. School kids these days are the biggest group of panty-wasted, spoiled, little creeps as I have ever seen. Most students I have encountered wouldn’t know how to string a proper sentence together if their lives depended upon it. Also, they are collectively the largest, non-reading group of students who no longer communicate effectively unless it’s by way of some social network. Sorry, but the world is not headed up by snot-nosed kids…I think adults are still in charge of things. We have given far too much “cred” to these little people and it’s time they are put in their place and asked to do a full-measure of work for their grades. Helicopter parenting is soooooo passe these days. Parents…get over it. Why do you insist on protecting your kids when they are clearly on the side of wrong? What bad, multiple lessons are you transferring to them when you defend their idiotic behaviors and skewed attitudes about themselves (self-importance) and the world (most can’t even identify major countries on a world map or do math at an appropriate level). No wonder we lag so far behind several countries in the world when it comes to education. And…just so you don’t think I totally one way on this subject…teachers – please stop enabling these folks and cease with the grade inflation. You’re only setting many of them up for failure and disappointment when they get to college and learn that the system has let them down. Many will need to get used the the phrase….”…and will you have fries with that sandwich today”? We get what we deserve. I fear for the future.
March 5th, 2011 at 5:42 pm
This is an outrage… she did nothing wrong… this is bullying by the parents and students… teachers have to put up with this all the time… this is why collective bargaining rights are SO important for teachers… otherwise you are at the mercy of any irate parent or student… its wrong….
And so incredibly sad…
March 11th, 2011 at 5:37 pm
I disagree very sharply with those who claim Ms. Monroe did nothing wrong. The comments she publicly posted in the blogosphere were outrageously disrespectful to her students, the very people for whom she should be modelling responsible, respectful behavior.
April 2nd, 2011 at 1:13 pm
As a 28-year veteran in the teaching profession, I have only one comment. Never, never put any negative comments about individual students in writing, anywhere.
Our society has come to a point where “it takes a village to raise a child”, because parents aren’t doing it. And when educators try, we are crucified for the attempt.