advice on a male teacher at DDs school please

[happydappy2]

My DD in year 9 used to have a wonderful female PE teacher who went on mat leave & might not come back. Currently a young male teacher has taken over and the girls feel uncomfortable when he watches them doing PE. One of them has looked at his social media & seen who he is following on instagram....lots of female body builders who pose in skimpy barely there bikinis (as is normal for body builders) but also some young women who pose in a very sexualised way in barely there bikinis....lots of boobs & bum on show. (Not topless but good as.) One girl has asked me if that is appropriate for a teacher & I'm struggling with how I feel about this. I would have thought all teachers have to have squeaky clean social media or set it to private. I've asked the headmaster for his views but wondered what others thought-am I over reacting or is this not really OK?

Just got an email from the school they are closing. 4 days in after half term. Lots of teachers testing positive. I hope they are okey. Such an exposed profession at the moment

@Readandwalk

Where is everyone getting the idea that teachers are told to keep SM private? In 24 years of teaching I have never been told this or advised this. We are asked not to make 'friends' with current students. Thats it..

Speaking only for myself, @Readandwalk - I’m getting it from ds2 who qualified as a secondary school teacher just over 2 years ago. He says they were warned to make their social media private.

I’ve been a teacher for 25 years.

13 or so years ago we were advised not to have social media at all

Now the advice is to lock it as tight as poss. This is reinforced by head of safeguarding every term

Ofsted outstanding school for safeguarding.

@Readandwalk

Where is everyone getting the idea that teachers are told to keep SM private? In 24 years of teaching I have never been told this or advised this. We are asked not to make 'friends' with current students. Thats it..

Every September inset. We are advised and encouraged to have all out SM profiles private and preferably use different names too.

I already ticked both boxes before starting to work at the school so not an issue really.

@Readandwalk

Where is everyone getting the idea that teachers are told to keep SM private? In 24 years of teaching I have never been told this or advised this. We are asked not to make 'friends' with current students. Thats it..

We were told at least eight years ago. And my daughter who's been teaching for ten years knew to do so within her probationary year.

Though that was because one of her friends ended up in a national newspaper when a parent stalked the FB page of another of her teacher friends, found a photo of them both at a hen night, and complained to the school. The photoof them having fun (but not remotely indecently dressed or behaving badly) was printed in the paper.

Fortunately both young women's Head Teachers were supportive. But the publicity made most schools realise that their staff needed advising to lock their pages down.

Oh, and my school had a specific social media policy, And every member of staff, teaching and non-teaching had to read and sign it.

@Readandwalk

Where is everyone getting the idea that teachers are told to keep SM private? In 24 years of teaching I have never been told this or advised this. We are asked not to make 'friends' with current students. Thats it..

It’s been completely the norm for the last few years at least for schools to tell teachers to keep their SM private, so it’s very odd that no one has told you or advised you this.

Do you have regular safeguarding training at your current school?

neu.org.uk/advice/social-media-model-policy-schools

I can’t help wondering exactly where Readandwalk has been teaching for the last 24 years 🤔

@TalkingtoLangClegintheDark

And incredibly depressing to see the way teenage girls are being vilified on here.

Great posts, NiceGerbil.

it's equally depressing that a Teacher can be character assassinated too.

Where have I been teaching. A GDST school. A Harris Academy school and a lcomprehensive. All reputable, probably taught some of your London based children.we were asked to not befriend students on SM
So less of the patronising comments please. There are no "rules" re privacy that I was ever told. Only guidelines and advice.

I think I know my own experience.

Probably harris invictus, explains everything!

@Readandwalk

Where have I been teaching. A GDST school. A Harris Academy school and a lcomprehensive. All reputable, probably taught some of your London based children.we were asked to not befriend students on SM So less of the patronising comments please. There are no "rules" re privacy that I was ever told. Only guidelines and advice.

I think I know my own experience.

No-one's saying you don't know your own experience. We're just gobsmacked that there's a school out there that doesn't have a social media policy.

I doubt there are any local authority schools that don't. It's been standard for some time for LEAs to draft a policy that schools can use as is, or tweak to fit their circumstances. Interesting that Harris doesn't care to.

@TalkingtoLangClegintheDark

And incredibly depressing to see the way teenage girls are being vilified on here.

Great posts, NiceGerbil.

I don’t think they have been vilified. Just reality of a bunch of immature young students.

I taught Y9 girls and collectively they were the worst year. Nightmare mare.

I’m female and have three Dds!

@Readandwalk - do you think it is a good idea for teachers to keep their social media private? I can't imagine why it wouldn't be - teachers need their privacy - surely it could be very difficult for the teacher if their pupils could see everything about their private lives.

I'm surprised by the information in the thread. I'd assumed that EVERYONE kept their social media private.

I'm old and out of touch so only do Facebook, not Instagram, Snapchat etc. But I have my profile set to only be viewable by friends, and pretty much anyone I've ever tried to look up has been the same.

Given the number of stories you read of peoples' SM coming back to bite them in the arse years later, I can't imagine anything more careless than just opening it all up to the world. Whether you work with kids or not.

I'm surprised by the information in the thread. I'd assumed that EVERYONE kept their social media private.

No, most people have public profile. That’s the default when you set it up.

@Noideawottodo

Oh really? How's that then? Just use your friends instead?

You type the name of the person and the name of the site into Google, et voila. Eg: "Jacob Smith instagram" and up comes Jacob Smith's Instagram.

Surely, you've heard of Google?

Lolol

Google
Friends
Yes?

I find it odd how so many people look up people they meet our know. My parents were telling me last year how they'd googled their neighbours to find out their jobs as they didn't understand how they had so much money.

I was

They said don't tell us you don't do that sort of thing! Erm. No. I'm not a nosy snob.

But yes it's totally normal to Google people. And if public their am stuff will all be right there.

Doesn't everyone know this?

Fact is enough teachers have said locking is standard advice and it's been in training for years for me at least to believe that is the norm.

I really don't care if the PE teacher's SM is private or not, but the girls sound like they know they needed some proof before they could go to adults for feeling icky around him. They know people don't believe girls when they say a man makes them uncomfortable.

Why not take the girls' lived experience at face value and for god's sake take them seriously? Why should they have to search SM to get someone in charge to give a shit about them?!?

Teachers have been sacked for their social media activity in the past.

As people with responsibility for young people, and with a view to role modeling, understanding that children and young people can and do look this up and taking into account that it's not a good idea to have your personal info in the hands of children/ young people, and around safeguarding and etc and so on...

Yes it does matter

Private companies have social media policies for their employees. Why this idea that teachers, who are in a position of trust and power to a massive range of children from various situations etc, should be less careful?

“I don’t think they have been vilified. Just reality of a bunch of immature young students.

I taught Y9 girls and collectively they were the worst year. Nightmare mare”.

Yes, you sound like the excuse makers I heard for one of the most prolific paedo teachers this country has known.

We are advised to keep sm private and to a minimum, why, because kida and arenta stalking staff and using what they find to bully, share with press or to try to get staff sacked. This awful media may be someone having a glass of wine, being drunk, doing pole exercise etc. All my media is locked, but i live in a small area so every so often have kids tell me their mums mates sister know me and they found old pics on a friends site 🙄
My experiences in school were between the ages of 12-15 male pe teachers under the age of 50 made everyone uncomfortable, i think everyone was said to be having an affair. They weren't but that was all girls talked about, oh and the younger ones (I went to a large secondary school) were all flirting or creepy. Most of it was all in the hormone filled heads of the girls, but could easily have cost a teacher their career. So this guy is an idiot to have unlocked social media, if it is def his. Maybe there is something creepy about him, you have informed the head but maybe it is gossip and hormones and imagination. Hopefully you have confidence in the school to look into it and ensure safeguarding is a priority.