Virginia Becomes First State to Mandate Internet Safety Lessons

kaufmanmoore writes "The Commonwealth of Virginia has become the first state in the nation to require that students in all grade levels receive a form of internet safety lessons. The story is scant on details about the lessons, but describes one recently at a high school where the presenter showed a social-networking profile of a convicted sex offender posing as a 15 year-old girl. "

Relevant education

[HalAtWork]

I wish schools would teach people about things they need to do in life such as how to get a house and all the necessary utilities, how to rent an apartment, how to open a bank account and what you might want to do to prepare your finances for the future, how to look for a job, etc.

Re:This is great but...

[d34thm0nk3y]

I'm not "Won't someone think of the children? apologist."

Nice, the article is tagged as such already.

We are talking about schools here. We should actually think about the children in this case....

Re:This is great but...

[webmaster404]

Wow, way to combine three typical slashdot dislikes. First, it was the federal government who gave us the DMCA, not Virginia. Second, a lot of the DMCA makes sense (the safe-harbor provisions). I suppose you are talking about the generality of the term 'encryption scheme' so that it applies to ROT-13 and the law against having mechanisms to get around it? Well, even that seems more carelessly written than evil.

While that is true, government is government is government. I was referring to how it was illegal to do some (seemingly) perfectly legal things such as install modchips, break CSS to duplicate DVDs, break DRM on your media... Im not saying that the DMCA is necessarily evil, but it stops innovation nonetheless.

And even if there was a lot of anti-piracy in the class, that 1) seems valid, as pirated software is more likely to have spyware than the non-pirated alternative (exception that proves the rule, P2P clients). 2) Even if it was used to curb piracy, how does that lead to a lack of innovation? I would understand software patents, but... 3) Even if that was a negative consequence, teaching kids good online habits seems to outweigh it. 4) Piracy *is* illegal, and the government *should* su support upholding the law.

Because, soon enough, what starts out as no "piracy" becomes no P2P, becomes no owning your programs, becomes no owning your media (see how this can grow, we are already to where P2P == piracy and MS/DMCA is pushing to no owning programs/media....)

Most kids already know good online habits, everyone knows you shouldn't go with random strangers online. Sure there are some stupid ones that will do whatever a 50 year old man tells them to, but some people don't think that coffee is going to be hot and sue McDonalds, does that really justify a warning label?

The problem though is, it won't be "piracy is illegal and so don't do it" it will be some online predators use pirated versions of Windows which probably is a fact, then it becomes all online predators use pirated Windows, then it becomes pirating Windows == online stalking.

Bottom line, its not what it is today, it is what it could be tomorrow that I am pointing out.

More info

[esocid]

From the VA Department Of Education [virginia.gov]. They even have some nifty power points. /grumble

Re:kneejerk reaction

[Conspicuous Coward]

I agree that teaching children some basic lessons on internet use and safety isn't necessarily a bad idea in the modern world.

The thing that really troubles me though is the paranoid attitute underlying all this, and the reasons this descision was made, to quote TFA

Virginia's requirement initially stemmed from concerns about sex offenders preying on children online and a general increase in Internet-based crime. It took effect this school year.

Statistically a child in the US is 2.5 times more likely to be hit by lightning than to be the victim of abduction by a stranger. Cases of strangers abusing children are actually vanishingly rare events.

So by all means teach children about internet safety, but do so in a calm and rational way that adresses what real danger there is without trying to scare the hell out of them. The real danger here is that we bring up our children to be suspicious and mistrusfull of just about everyone, which actually has far more serious consequnces for society.

Probably offtopic, but I think maybe we should ask ourselves why the mass media spend so much of their energy blowing inconsequential dangers out of all proportion to create this generalised sense of fear, whose interests this serves, and why the hell we still listen. This is part of a general pattern, and looking at the society around me it seems to be having a profound effect.

Re:Abdication of responsibility

[Anonymous Coward]

When was this mystical "some time ago" you speak so lovingly of? When I was in the 7th grade we had a mandatory health education class followed in the 8th grade by a mandatory sex education class. These were in 1954 and 1955, respectively. The class on how to dress for success would have been appreciated.

Re:This is great but...

[Firethorn]

If the classes were a 1 hour session of someone saying "Hey kids, them thar internets can be dangerous. Don't go trusting people. Use common sense.", that would be fine.

Well, to be honest, as common sense isn't so common, I'd cover some specific issues, like how to recognize scams, internet predators, basic guidelines to protect your identity, and so on.

Of course, personally I'd fold it into my idea for a 'life studies' course - no it doesn't have much to do with biology. It's simply the best name I can think of at the moment.

Basically, it's a course designed to impart the skills generally necessary for a fulfilling life in a modern society. I started off with sex ed, gun safety, spread out to basic liability, contract and criminal law*. Not falling for scams, whether it be real world or internet. Practical budgeting, house purchase procedures, etc... In areas where it's necessary, how to properly do laundry, basic healthy cooking**. Basically, what stuff is good to know, doesn't take a whole semester or more dedicated to teaching it, and at least possibly isn't covered by existing courses, as I'm sure some rearranging could occur.

I mean, I don't know about you guys, but while my parents covered liability and such, I didn't get much of it in school, but I see examples all the time where it would have saved a lot of money, effort, and stress if they had known a bit of it. Sure, history and geography is all to the good, but I spent months memorizing maps - so I could pass quizzes that consisted of a map with the names removed and slots to put the missing names cities, rivers and lakes in. I guarantee that I performed a brain dump after each quiz. I know where Baghdad, Tikrit, and the Tigris river is on the map more because I'm in the USAF and have to worry about it. I didn't care in High School, I knew how to read a map and index even back then.

And that's just ONE example of courses that I feel were more or less wasted time when I was young. Especially given the easy reference and research source today - the internet. History courses are good, though I think there should be less emphasis(at least compared to my time) on names and exact dates.

*Possibly involving carefully selected TV court cases off of shows like Judge Judy.
**Preferably tasty, because that's the best way to get people to eat it.