School use of the Internet takes on a very different flavor when students are able to display vivid graphics on the screens of their monitors. Individual use of text files, however offensive in content, was unlikely to cause much turmoil, but the monitor can act as a billboard for exciting visual material, changing the rules and the stakes of the game. Schools typically already restrict the kinds of graphical displays permitted on student clothing. One way to handle the challenge of explicit graphics is to treat it in the same way as T-shirts. The point is that although one student may gain parent permission for independent work, that student may offend others during such research.
Schools being public, the issue becomes quite complex.
The background is from Jay Boersma. Other drawings and graphics are by Jamie McKenzie. Materials published in From Now On may be duplicated in hard copy format educational, non-profit school district use only. All other uses, transmissions and duplications are prohibited unless permission is granted expressly. Showing these pages remotely through frames is not permitted.