Mindlab by Unitec: Legal Contexts and Digital Identities

22 February 2016 (APC Week 30 - Activity 8)
Legal Contexts and Digital Identities

When we are in a professional role of any kind, we're likely guided or governed by a code of ethics. In New Zealand, a practising teacher must abide by the following Educational Council (2016) precepts:

"The professional interactions of teachers are governed by four fundamental principles:

• Autonomy to treat people with rights that are to be honoured and defended
• Justice to share power and prevent the abuse of power
• Responsible care to do good and minimise harm to others
• Truth to be honest with others and self." (Source)

These professional guidelines also allude to following the law and honouring the Treaty of Waitangi, the latter of which I will discuss in an upcoming blog post. 

With the use of social media being so prevalent at this time, both within and outside of the classroom, there is a need for educators to begin to understand how this new 'openess' of 'sharing' so much about ourselves can potentially compromise impact on both our professional ethics and private moral values.

The cautionary tale of the ficticious Teri Sanders in the clip below is perhaps more common than we realise - in this day and age, we've all seen 'friends' and colleagues who 'overshare' and leave us with our own ethical dilemmas.

It's likely we have all heard cases of teachers taken quietly to one side by their school principle for images of their tipsy selves or too obvious comments on social media. There's even an awareness that 'old' images or unpopular opinions shared on social media preventing people from getting jobs or losing 'tenure'. 

Where the social media behaviour has broken teaching codes of ethics in extreme ways, disciplinary action is often taken; yet, there are as of yet no specific professional teaching code of ethics for teachers at a national level in New Zealand to guide our profession.

No doubt we've all at some time or another attended staff meetings to review our school code of ethics around digital media and copyright laws at some time or another, often in response to an incident in our midst or after a particularly high profile media case...

As the technology has zoomed ahead of us, it appears to have been up to individual schools to respond to the ethical gray areas that have presented themselves.  

However, it seems timely that we all necessarily consider how our professional ethics relate to our own use of social media in our dual roles as educators and members of our communities. 

With so many schools and educators now integrating the use of social media in their ubiquitous approaches - whether it's a website, blog, Youtube, Facebook or Twitter presence, to name a few examples - we all need to recognise the ethical and legal implications for each of us in this globalised online world!

Topic: The Influence of Law and Ethics on Professional Practise
References Cited & Recommended Reading / Viewing

Cinelearning. (2014, June 7). Teacher Ethics Video - Social Media Dilemma HD. [video file] Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGQbLSEPN5w on 28th March 2016.
Chrystie. (2016, January 7). The $7,500 Blogging mistake that every blogger needs to avoid. [Blog post].
Collste, G.(2012) Applied and professional ethics. Kemanusiaan, 19(1), 17–33.
Connecticut’s Teacher Education and Mentoring Program.(2012) Ethical and Professional Dilemmas for Educator: Facilitator’s Guide.
Education Council (NZ). The Education Council Code of Ethics for Certficated Teachers. Retrieved from https://educationcouncil.org.nz/content/code-of-ethics-certificated-teachers-0 on 28th March 2016.
New Zealand Teachers Council.(2012). Establishing safeguards.[video file].
New Zealand Teachers Council (2012). Commitment to Parents/Guardians and Family/Whānau. [video file].
New Zealand Teachers Council. (2015). Teachers & Social Media.
Ministry of Education (2015). Digital technology- Safe and responsible use in school.