In this article, the author states that school librarians can contribute to an atmosphere that supports intellectual freedom by drawing attention to the subtle messages about community values--messages that are communicated by virtue of what is included or excluded from curricular and co-curricular offerings. The author address issues with…

Bullying is a social problem. The proliferation of electronic technology has provided a new forum for bullies to harm victims. That is, bullies can transmit harmful text messages, photos, or video over the Internet and other digital communication devices to victims. This malpractice of technology-oriented phenomenon known as cyberbullying has…

The introduction of widespread school Internet access in industrialised countries has been accompanied by the materialisation of what can be labelled as a national school e-safety agenda. Drawing upon Foucault's notions of discourse and governmentality, this paper explores how e-safety policy documents serve to constrain the conceptual…

Social web services catalog users' activities across the Internet, aggregating, analyzing, and selling a vast array of user data to be used largely for consumer profiling and target marketing. This article interrogates the tacit agreements and terms-of-use policies that govern who owns user data, how it circulates, and how it can be used. Relying…

The use of evidence-based practices has become a focus in education since the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act reauthorization of 2004 required using practices based on scientific research to improve student outcomes. Although many teachers may not have the time or expertise to evaluate the…

This article reports on findings from a scan of 465 policies relevant to the handling of cyberbullying in 74 Canadian universities. It first assesses the commonalities and differences in the policies. Second, it considers how their various lenses--a human rights perspective versus a student conduct perspective, for instance--can affect the…

The U.S. Supreme Court declined without comment to take up two major appeals involving student free-speech rights on the Internet. One appeal encompassed two cases decided in favor of students last June by the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit, in Philadelphia. The other appeal stemmed from a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for…

In education, technology is giving new meaning to the phrase "equal opportunity." Teachers and students in schools across America--urban, rural, wealthy, and impoverished--are gaining access to online learning and all of its benefits through broadband technology. What is broadband? According to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), it is…

Many of the recent legal decisions regarding public employee expression, particularly in electronic environments, run counter to the culture being facilitated by the Internet. This article uses a legal analysis to examine recent decisions and then considers those legal positions within the context of digital expression. (Contains 2 notes.)

Public libraries are heavily affected by political and policy-making processes that shape the funding, activities, and roles of libraries in society, with the explosion of information policy decisions in the past two decades significantly increasing the responsibilities of libraries while also increasing limitations on their activities. Research…

Almost everyone uses social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn. Since Facebook is the most popular site in the history of the Internet, this article will focus on how one can protect his/her personal information and how that extends to protecting the private information of others.

"If one life is saved, then it's worth it." That is the cliched argument frequently used to justify banning electronic communications, websites, and other forms of technology in schools. The common belief is that these prohibitions will prevent, among other things, the sexual assault of minors or suicides related to cyberbullying. But that…

As use of the Internet becomes more prevalent in society and daily living, there has been increased attention to the risks, especially threats that young people may face. One of these risks is online sexual solicitation, in which an individual contacts a minor over the Internet, generally with the intent of making face-to-face sexual contact.…

It is recognised that from a young age children spend considerable portions of their leisure time on the Internet. In Australia a number of child-targeted magazines have associated websites, which have high and ever-increasing readership. We do not yet know the impact of this medium upon children. Overt advertising is evident on webpages, but so…

The authors recognise that there is no "one-size-fits-all" approach to implementing business intelligence strategy within universities. Elements of best practice have been taken from a case study of Imperial College, which may be applied across other institutions. The process starts with implementing and developing systems that capture…