Content Management, Online Safety, Privacy, CIPA, and Sanity

In December of 2000 I was fortunate to be invited to participate in the Workshop on Non-Technical Strategies for Protecting Children from Pornography on the Internet and Their Applicability to Other Inappropriate Internet Content presented by the Committee on Tools and Strategies for Protecting Kids form Pornography and Their Applicability to Other Inappropriate Internet Content.

The purpose of the workshop was to gather information and report the findings back to Congress. The only problem was that the committee report was due in four months and Congress would be voting on CIPA in a few days. It was obvious that our work would have no impact on the decision on whether or not to pass CIPA.

It was almost as obvious that schools were going to have to filter if they wanted federal money and that the work we did there would have direct application in helping schools create a learning environment that was safe and consistent with the educational philosophy of the school and the values of the community.

To some, that might mean creating a system that blocks objectionable material in a wide range of filtering categories. To others who would have opted for not filtering, it means creating a system that meets the mandates of CIPA, but provides open access to educationally relevant material.

During the workshop, participants broken into teams and were each given one of five sets of school district demographics for which to draft content management plans and policies for keeping students safe on the Internet.

You will be using those same demographics start a similar process that you may hopefully continue when you return to your respective districts. You will be doing it with the backdrop of CIPA and the help of guide questions from the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) and resources provided here.