Today s young people grow up using the latest technologies and navigating through cyberspace. Schools are doing an increasingly good job teaching students how to use the new technologies. However, the curricula are currently insufficient to address the responsibility issue. Children are not learning to carry over the basic values of honesty and respect for others and their property to the cyber realm. Their computer skills exceed their capacity to make judgments about the appropriateness and consequences of their behavior.
Recent statistics highlight the magnitude of the problem.
From another perspective, the Public Agenda s Reality Check surveys examined how employers rate young people s honesty. Schools can help change this trend. A comprehensive cyber ethics curriculum for pre-kindergarten through college would enable children to grow up learning how to be responsible cybercitizens. The October conference at Marymount University will initiate the process for developing the appropriate curriculum for each age group. U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno has been invited to give the opening keynote address.