Head teacher's attempt to cracking down on social media use by parents

[TamaraHiddlestoned]

Does anyone have experience of a primary HT trying to limit parents' discussion of school standards & behaviour on social media?
Our HT wants to prevent any mention of the school or staff by any parent & in any context.
Aside from the impracticalities of this, and assuming that no laws are broken, does the HT actually have any power to do this?

Thanks for helping me to understand!

Of course it's their business to stop staff being defamed or the school.

Loads of this thread shows that lots of parents know all about their rights, but little about responsibilities. Oh and that made up legal expert opinion is taken at face value, rather than the actual law.

Defamation is not limited to individuals. Companies can sue for libel, for example, as could an independent school, if they can show whatever has been put out there has caused or is likely to cause serious financial loss, which sounds pretty unlikely in this context, but is possible.

Government and governmental institutions (local authorities, state schools, NHS trusts etc) can't sue in defamation, but they can be sued.

There is absolutely no power to stop parents in general discussing the school, their own or other peoples' children, the staff, or anything else on social media. Blanket discussion bans aren't permissible.

Of course, any aggrieved person could sue a poster after something has been put on social media-in defamation, malicious falsehood, under the Protection from Harassment Act or any other civil cause of action they thought fitting. Really terrible postings could result in criminal action under the Malicious Communications Act or something similar. Posting something that discloses another's personal information without their permission could well be a breach of the Data Protection Act.

It still would not be a matter for the HT, unless she were the person who was suing.

I think the thread demonstrates that if a headteacher claims the backing of the law but doesn't bother to check whether that's correct, she can seriously mess up on what would otherwise be a perfectly reasonable request.

Badbadbunny

If you are so happy about teachers being spoken about on ratemyteacher, would you be happy with a ratetheparent or ratemypupil website?

Now every teachers email address is published on the school website and subject teachers print it in the cover of pupil exercise books. Significant chunks of communication is now direct email.

Thank goodness that doesn't happen in any school I know of. No parents communicate directly with teachers. Any communication is by phone or email to the school office which is then passed on to teachers,

Staff email addresses are written alongside every name on the staff list on the school website at our secondary school. Not the primaries though (except the heads email address).

"If you are so happy about teachers being spoken about on ratemyteacher, would you be happy with a ratetheparent or ratemypupil website? "

We do that anyway, in the staff room. Or rather it should be called judgethatparent.

We have a Facebook page. It is closed and secret and the rules are very clear and repeated each year. There is no discussion of individuals at all - either teachers or pupils.

It is invaluable. There are dedicated parents who look at the calendar and do invitations to events which they update so when the non- uniform day changes with 2 hours notice I get an automatic update.

It is also good for rounding up volunteers for pta etc.

The school know about it and the parents have made it clear that teachers can be members of they wish.

More schools should set up social media usage like that one, if the parents can't be trusted to do do themselves.

Tiggytape, OP said - admittedly under a namechange - that the head claimed that laws were being broken. My post was in response to smallfox's about that point.

Actually, sorry, it wasn't OP who said that - on looking further, it seems to be someone else who had a similar experience. But my point related to the thread as a whole, not just the OP.

It always amuses me when teachers think parents are quaking in fear at the prospect of being judged by them. My experience may be a bit jaundiced because it mainly relates to SEN, but having come across far too many parents who are judged adversely by some teachers for trying to get proper support for their children, I know that parents get to a point where they really don't give a fuck at the prospect of said teachers being so unprofessional as to laugh at them in the staffroom.

It amuses me that you think teachers are judging parents

"I know that parents get to a point where they really don't give a fuck at the prospect of said teachers being so unprofessional as to laugh at them in the staffroom."

Yet you'll defend the right of parents to make judgements and post them on the internet and do things which might effect their career?

All about the rights and not about the responsibilities as I said. Oh and its not unprofessional to laugh about parents in the staffroom, as long as those views are kept private and don't effect your working relationship its fine. When you see how some parents behave only laughter could get you through.

BTW I've been on both sides.

affect

"Most parents who use social media as a place to gossip and off-load their opinions and grievances about schools are ill-informed and destructive."

That may be true.

That's why it's important that schools get with the programme and learn how to use social media.

Instead of behaving like King Canute, they need to accept that FB and other social media sites in all their glory and awfulness, are part of the landscape now and they need to engage with them. We can't just wish they didn't exist. Perhaps if most schools were better at communication, parents wouldn't be ignorant and ill-informed. A school website which welcomed polite feedback and explained properly why the uniform has to be bought from a monopoly outlet, why hair has to be worn in a certain way, why homework needs to be in by Monday, what the school is doing about GCSE's etc., would neutralise a lot of the directionless rantings that some people go into on FB.

"It amuses me that you think teachers are judging parents"

See Smallfox's post of 18.05

We do Basil its true, but then all you need to do is read some of the threads on here to see how ridiculous some parents are, or see how poorly behaved they are towards others.

"Perhaps if most schools were better at communication, parents wouldn't be ignorant and ill-informed"

Oh I'm sorry, I didn't realise that having websites, sending out emails to the adresses we were given on enrolment, and then giving the children paper copies of the same communiques wasn't enough.

From the rest of your post, I'd say that it'll take a lot more than good communication from a school to cure your own ignorance.

How about a parent on Facebook saying there are drugs in the boys' toilets and students drinking behind the PE changing rooms at lunchtime.

This is what happened at DH's school recently. Head contacted parent who said her son had been having a laugh when he told her and she hadn't realised. The idiot mother's very dangerous response was to put it on Facebook, not report it to the school. Other parents then accepted it as true - because everything on Facebook is true of course. They were commenting and gossiping like mad. Parents of children in their primary schools saw it and were put off. The parent gave Head a mouthful of abuse when she was asked not to post comments about the school again and remove the post.
It is irrespnsible behaviour by people who have no idea or desire to use social media responsibly. Numbers of the parents at his school get involved swearing and threatening teenagers their child has fallen out with - all on social media. They are pathetic in the true sense of the word and have no care to the consequences of their actions.

Or parents making comments about the school on twitter and @ ing the school twitter page because, yes Basil, the school has made an attempt to communicate with parents in more than one way. Said parent makes a very serious child protection accusation against a staff member and the next day the teacher is unable to teach, is the subject of an investigation, and the local press are sniffing around.

Teacher had no case to answer, but certainly could have claimed libel damages.

I hope HTs put as much effort into stopping teenage children from defaming/bullying each other on social media as they do protecting their schools and staff.

AskBasil

Perhaps if most schools were better at communication, parents wouldn't be ignorant and ill-informed.

Some parents are wilfully ignorant and ill-informed by choice.

Some parents you can never get hold of on any of their phone numbers or email addresses.

Some parents have never attended an open evening, parents evening or meeting arranged by the teachers or other pastoral staff members .

Some parents refuse to discuss anything or believe that their children are capable of doing wrong, and the school (and teachers) just like all the others and are picking on/bullying their child.

Some parents ring up after their child has done badly in their GCSEs and blame the school because the child has done no work for five years, disrupted lessons and didn't revise.

These are the ones that post the comments on fb, forums and go to papers and try to put the school in to a bad light.

Not all schools are perfect, but education is a two way street and parents need to communicate with the school as well.[

"I hope HTs put as much effort into stopping teenage children from defaming/bullying each other on social media as they do protecting their schools and staff"

You should see the amount of trouble things posted on social media cause, and how much time goes into dealing with them.

I agree-our school spends a large amount of time tackling online bullying.