Infographic: Citizenship in the digital age By now it’s become clear: For all its wonders, the digital age has also introduced its fair share of challenges. From social media and cyberbullying to cybercrime, internet addiction and online privacy concerns, today’s students face a wide range of difficult issues that previous generations never had to think about. As a result, teachers, school leaders and parents are called on to add a whole new idea to our curricula: digital citizenship. And yet, we don’t have to start from scratch. What’s new — for educators as well as students — is learning how to apply these ideals to the digital age. “As many educators know, most students want to do the right thing — and will, if they know what that is,” said Mike Ribble, author of Digital Citizenship in Schools and co-founder of the new Digital Citizenship Network. Check out the infographic below to see how the characteristics of a good citizen parallel — and differ from — those of a good digital citizen.
SW 2.0: Going Where the Client Is: Exploring Virtual Clinical Social Work Practice By: Karen Zgoda, MSW, LCSW, ABD Editor’s Note: This is the final installment in Karen Zgoda’s SW 2.0 series. In the past three years, Karen has introduced THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER’s readers to many innovative uses of technology. I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to Karen for sharing her passion for and knowledge of all things tech with our readers. It was a dark and not-so-stormy night. At least it was in Boston, where I was physically located, and across the river into Cambridge, where Mike Langlois was. The G+ experience raises some interesting questions about learning, social work practice, and human interaction and connection. Nancy and Mike are at the forefront of incorporating virtual technologies into their practices. We need to learn how to use this stuff to stay competitive and show up on the radar or folks will not select us as a profession. Anytime most people are using something and we refuse to know about it, that’s a problem. Nancy adds, most importantly: Gaming
How Clean Is Your Digital Footprint? - KWHS While she’s in the midst of a flurry of college applications, Lillian Donahue isn’t taking the chance that a blemish from her digital footprint may be the difference between getting the thumbs up from Arizona State University, her top choice, and watching someone else get her acceptance letter. Donahue is constantly reviewing her social media feeds – Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn – for things like suggestive or immature language that could be controversial or unsavory in the eyes of college admissions professionals who may be taking a peek at her online life. If she’s not sure how a post may be received, it gets the ax. Digital DNA Donahue’s future employers may be looking, too, even years down the road. A digital footprint is all the stuff you post online on your social media accounts, in comment sections, while playing an app or sending an email. Donahue says she avoided some “serious trouble” by taking a joke off Twitter about one of her teachers.
10 Interactive Lessons By Google On Digital Citizenship YouTube has a firm place in the current classroom. From Khan Academy’s videos to YouTube EDU and beyond, there’s a reason all these videos are finding a home in schools. In an effort to help keep the ball rolling, Google just launched a set of 10 interactive lessons designed to support teachers in educating students on digital citizenship. Google (which owns YouTube) built the lessons to educate students about YouTube’s policies, how to flag content, how to be a safer online citizen, and protect their identities. Below is a list of lessons, and the recommended flow for delivery. Or you can download the Full Teacher’s Guide or the Full Set of Slides in PDF. The killer feature for this curriculum is the extra features that come with each video. —Via Edudemic
Social Media and Social Work | Social Media Ethics in Social Work Social media apps offer social workers powerful aids to their practices, but new ethical dilemmas, as well. Practitioners are figuring out how to utilize programs such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Web-based blogs in ways that are consistent with the long-standing rules of their areas of practice—and they don’t all agree on how to go about it. “I think that it’s important for us to consider our online presence and to be able to look at the challenges that our online presence poses for us… how our online presence complements or conflicts with our professional sense,” Kathryn Chernack, a licensed counselor, said during a January 2013 interview with Steven Schwartz of the University of Buffalo-School of Social Work’s “InSocialWork” podcast series. The Social Media Challenge Kathryn Chernack knows the challenges firsthand as a private-practice counselor and the director of clinical services for community residential programs at St. Checking Social Media Profiles The Twitter Feed Sources:
Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older… This story was co-published with The New York Times. A few weeks ago, Verizon placed an ad on Facebook to recruit applicants for a unit focused on financial planning and analysis. The ad showed a smiling, millennial-aged woman seated at a computer and promised that new hires could look forward to a rewarding career in which they would be “more than just a number.” Some relevant numbers were not immediately evident. Ad From Verizon Verizon is among dozens of the nation's leading employers — including Amazon, Goldman Sachs, Target and Facebook itself — that placed recruitment ads limited to particular age groups, an investigation by ProPublica and The New York Times has found. The ability of advertisers to deliver their message to the precise audience most likely to respond is the cornerstone of Facebook’s business model. “It’s blatantly unlawful,” said Debra Katz, a Washington employment lawyer who represents victims of discrimination. Facebook defended the practice. ‘They Know I’m Dead’
Fantastic Resources for Teaching Digital Citizenship Education in Your Classroom About ETR Community EdTechReview (ETR) is a community of and for everyone involved in education technology to connect and collaborate both online and offline to discover, learn, utilize and share about the best ways technology can improve learning, teaching, and leading in the 21st century. EdTechReview spreads awareness on education technology and its role in 21st century education through best research and practices of using technology in education, and by facilitating events, training, professional development, and consultation in its adoption and implementation. Pause Before Posting — Using Social Media Responsibly January/February 2011 Issue Pause Before Posting — Using Social Media Responsibly By Matthew Robb, MSW, LCSW-C Social Work Today Vol. 11 No. 1 P. 8 Social workers using social media such as blogs, Facebook, message boards, or Twitter must think carefully about how their postings could affect their clients and their careers. On issues ranging from domestic violence and homophobia to racism and the insidious disease of breast cancer, a young MSW social worker blogs incisively about the African American experience. Her commentary is powerful, her passion palpable and persuasive. When she writes, readers take notice. But in a mid-September 2010 post, her hue and cry turned ice cold. Undeterred, she fired a second volley: “Some of you may question why I am focusing on the black woman? And so it goes—the wild world of desktop publishing. Going Rogue From the outset, let’s be clear: Our profession has leveraged social media to astonishing effect. The social worker cited above isn’t alone.
The Truth About Data Mining: How Online Trackers Gather, See Your Info Companies like Google and Facebook use cookies to track users across multiple websites over an undisclosed amount of time. (Photo: Ksayer1/Flickr) Targeted ads have become a way of life. When you search for an airline flight, online snippets keep track of what you looked for and use this information to serve you catered ads. The collected data can be used to determine your ticket prices, decide which ads to show you in the future, and even go as far as change how you feel about yourself. There are many companies whose sole purpose is to gather and trade people’s information. It’s called targeted advertising, and it’s a side of the Internet so new there aren’t any regulations to control it. Below we’ll talk about the kind of information these companies can see, and how they can use it to both empty your wallet and further their own agenda. It All Starts with a Cookie Companies like Google and Facebook use cookies to track users across multiple websites over an undisclosed amount of time.
Back to School: What Can We Learn from Student Privacy Developments? Recent legislative developments relating to student privacy have something to teach everyone. For professionals in the education space, the developments signal significant forthcoming changes to policies and business practices. But there’s more to the developments than the creation of new sector-specific obligations. The way in which data-sharing agreements with vendors and business partners feature in the new student privacy laws is a good indicator of how important such agreements are becoming. Last year, parents and educators began to express concern about cloud-based services for educational institutions. According to the Data Quality Campaign, over 75 percent of state legislatures active in 2014 introduced student data privacy bills. If Brown signs the second California bill into law this month, California educational institutions will have just over three months to impose new requirements on providers of digital services for student data.
Social Work Tech | Creating Your Digital Social Work Tool Box (or Social Work Tool Kit) Get excited The Need For Practicality Sometimes, we as social workers have very good interventions that are sitting in our notepads, filing cabinets, or books we have purchased. Sometimes they are on other peoples’ blogs. What if I told you that you could easily access some interventions quickly, easily, and without distraction? Today, I’m going to show you how to begin to pull all of your resources together into one central location: your Social Work Tool Box Read More about how to make your own Digital Social Work Tool Box, after the break! What You’ll Need (and What’s Optional) You really don’t need anything other than your computer desktop to create your Social Work Tool Box. If you want to make your Social Work Tool Box mobile, then I have some app recommendations. Dropbox [FREE!] A magical app that EVERYONE should get! Dropbox is a free service that allows you to sync your files online and across computers (and other mobile devices). GoodReader for iPad ($4.99) [iTunes Link] Like this:
New ‘SNL’ Cast Member Shane Gillis Fired Over Racial Slur In Old YouTube Video Embattled stand-up comic Shane Gillis will not be joining Saturday Night Live this fall over the controversy surrounding his past racial slur use. The NBC comedy program just made the announcement, apologizing for any deficiencies in their vetting system that allowed for Gillis to be hired in the first place. “After talking with Shane Gillis, we have decided that he will not be joining SNL,” an SNL spokesperson said on behalf of Lorne Michaels. “We want SNL to have a variety of voices and points of view within the show, and we hired Shane on the strength of his talent as comedian and his impressive audition for SNL. We were not aware of his prior remarks that have surfaced over the past few days. The language he used is offensive, hurtful and unacceptable. Related Story Democratic Hopeful Andrew Yang Forgives 'SNL' Castmember Shane Gillis For Racial Slur Landing SNL was a big break for Gillis, whose résumé includes Comedy Central radio show The Bonfire. f