Issues With Technology In Schools

Social
Teachers are concerned about the social implications of leading an online life. They worry about the privacy of their students, overuse, misuse, and the risks associated with social networks. Privacy is one of the two most prominent fears about technology. The article "The Web's New Gold Mine: Your Secrets" published by the Wall Street Journal, and written by Julia Angwin, looks at how our lives are no longer our own online. There are companies out there that track everything we do and say online. They know who we are, where we live, what we like, and where we shop.

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Teachers' second largest concern is safety, particularly safety on social networks. Safety risks of social networking are so great that the FBI has written a statement detailing risks and how to protect yourself from them. By reading through these, teachers can help their students understand more about social networking and how to protect themselves from the dangerous parts of the Internet; not to say that the Internet itself is dangerous, more that there are dangerous people on the Internet.





Educational
There are also many issues concerning technology use from an educational standpoint. There is a lack of funding, accountability issues, debates over what the best ways to incorporate technology are, and a growing reliance on online education. The major issue is funding. Netbooks seemed to be the answer, they are relatively inexpensive and allow for one to one learning with technology. In 2010, Education Weekly posted an article about this netbook revolution. This article looks at the way that one school in California dealt with the issue of technology in their schools. Instead of depriving the students of technology, each student in the middle school was provided with a netbook for use in their core subjects. This allowed students to not only learn how to learn technology safely and in a positive environment, it also allowed them to learn how to integrate technology into multiple subjects. While it may not be cost effective for all schools to give all their students a netbook, there would definitely be benefits to purchasing a set of them for a class at a time to use along with computer labs in the schools.


Cultural and Equity Issues

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Not everyone has the same access to technology. There is a digital divide between students in different socioeconomic statuses and between those at different learning levels. Schools with less funding have a harder time acquiring technology for their schools. This means that schools in inner cities or very rural areas are unable to teach the same information (or as thoroughly) as wealthier school districts (source). This divide causes there to be a discrepancy in knowledge between those who can afford technological resources and those who cannot. 

Legal and Ethical Issues

There are many concerns about what is "right" and "wrong" on the Internet. There are issues with hacking, safety (see above), dishonesty, and illegal downloading. Plagiarism and academic dishonestly are some of the largest issues that teachers and students are facing with the integration of technology and learning. The New York Times' article "Plagiarism Lines Blur for Students in Digital Age" looks at how the concept of plagiarism has unfolded and what is being done about it. When the digital information era first began no one knew how to cite the information they were getting, particularly if it came from a site like Wikipedia. Today there are guidelines and tools such as TurnItIn that provide an easy way for teachers to check where their students are getting their information from.