<p>I agree that it’s a bad idea for teachers to friend their current students or students who haven’t yet graduated from their institution.</p>
<p>DH found that as coach he was going to have to set up a Facebook and/or myspace in order to contact his HS team. They no longer use email and cannot hear/don’t listen to the announcements. Sending info out through facebook groups seemed like like the only way to reach them.</p>
<p>I joined years ago and my kids friended me, though I try to be really unobtrusive. I’ve never mentioned anything I’ve seen on their pages. They told my wife, who is not tech-savvy and is less unobtrusive, that they wouldn’t friend her. My main concern is making sure that my 15 yo daughter (going on 23) doesn’t put pictures or content up that would be any more suggestive than the normal 15 yo female from a touchy-feely but pretty serious private high school.</p>
<p>My daughter does use it as a way of communicating with her friends along with texting and cell phones.</p>
<p>Emeraldkity–I am what is known as a “lurker.” I have fake Facebook/Myspace profiles so that I can look at others without actually saying who I am. Creepy? Yes! But, my ds knows I’m on there and has marked his facebook private so I can’t see it. I was actually really never trying to get a look at his, but he made the switch from a small private high school to a large public one and I found it helpful to look at Myspace pages to have some idea who the kids were and what they were like. My friend’s daughter thinks it’s appalling that I look at people’s pages without being their friend or without a real reason, but hey, I like to think I’ve made the point very clear to my son that if something is private and you put it on the internet then anybody can read it. Anybody. Even me.</p>
<p>Now, lately as he’s off at school I have been thinking that I’d like to have Facebook–not that he’d friend me–but I’d like to be able to keep in touch with some of his buddies that used to practically live at my house. I think though, that he’d find that intrusive so I didn’t do it. </p>
<p>I do think it’s going to become more popular for our generation too because it’s a very practical way to keep in touch.</p>
<p>I joined a couple of months ago to the chagrin of my youngest who is my “friend.” Of my four kids, the two youngest have let me be friends. Initially #3 (18) said, “nope, we can’t be friends” but then he changed his mind. Kid number 2 friended me but I am aware that she changed her privacy settings and I am limited to what I can see. I’m pretty certain this is because I have annoyed my kids by commenting on what their friends say, etc. Oldest son has not friended me yet and I won’t friend him – feel it should come from him. When I first joined, I e-mailed the kids and said, “I’m joining because I have friends in other parts of the world who are on facebook that I’d like to be in touch with, not because I am stalking you. Feel free to not accept me or to set your privacy settings.” A lot of young people who know me have friended me. I have never friended a friend of my kid’s but do accept if they approach me.</p>
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<p>I agree, no way would I friend a current student.</p>
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<p>Had to look them up–hip hop duo!!!</p>
<p>Yes, I have a Facebook page and it feels pretty weird, but I work with a lot of young people and they talked me into it. DS is not my friend, but he thinks my Facebook page is hilarious, particularly after I became a fan of Ken Jennings.</p>
<p>You all might want to try searching “college parents” on Facebook. I did this thinking I would find a group of like-minded parents with kids in college. Instead, I got groups like</p>
<p>“Facebook is for high school and college students, NOT for parents or teachers!”
“I can’t wait to go to college and get away from my parents”
“I went to college and my parents turned my room into a _____.”</p>
<p>and many, many more in the same vein. Trust me, you’ll lol.</p>
<p>The community organizations that I’m in have FB pages. It’s a marvelous and easy way to connect with others of similar interests. The kids who don’t want adults on it need to catch up with the present. If FB had stayed the same, it would only be for Harvard students.</p>
<p>Agree, Northstarmom. Separate groups can exist within the same networking site with no overlap, if that’s what they want. Son used to get touchy when I’d pass by the computer & he was on Facebook (“why are you looking at my Facebook??”). Now I just say, breezily, “I’m not interested in yours, I have my own!” </p>
<p>(I actually think this is healthier, at least in our case w/a mom who is, generally, pretty involved!). </p>
<p>It’s a great way to keep in touch, more casually, with friends far & near.</p>
<p>Imagine my surprise this morning when I get an email from Facebook saying my 24 year old son friended me!! I was kidding him last week about checking out my FB page and friend me, but I never thought he would do it. I guess at his age there is nothing there to surprise me. I did tell him to let his sister know that he friended me, not the other way around!</p>
<p>My 40 year old cousin just joined yesterday and today she has over 60 friends! She said it is from all her years at camp, but I thought it was funny that she could find that many people or they found her in less that a day. Goes to show how much time people spend on FB.</p>
<p>^^ Sometimes it is easy to add a bunch of friends at once. If you get a friend, and they are friends with a lot of people you know, you just go down their list and click “add friend”.</p>
<p>My H and I made Facebook accounts related to groups we’re involved with, although now I use mine more on an individual basis. Our S also has one and of course we won’t “friend” until he wants to, which I predict won’t happen until he’s at least 25!</p>
<p>I do have to keep reminding him to completely close his Facebook and Yahoo email, since on any number of occasions I will find them open. I promise not to pry, and I don’t, but even a quick glance while closing can be revealing … like the friend who’s now a freshman in college, who’s posted picture is of himself donned in nothing except a large/wide winter scarf, with a fully clothed pretty female giving him a hug. I work on a group with this young man’s mother and have said nothing …</p>
<p>I am a parent (although my oldest is only 12) and I am a college student and I have a facebook account. One of my college friends (who is traditional college age) posted something about something she had done the night before. Her mom posted after her saying “Mom doesn’t want to know” and then her GRANDMA said “Oh, but Grandma does!” lol My friend is pretty horrified that fb is so intergenerational for her.<br>
However, I just don’t think fb can be regarded as a young person website anymore. More and more adults and professionals are on it, and people are really starting to use it as a reunion site, like classmates only free.</p>
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<p>This is a touchy issue. I know of at least two of D2’s former high school teachers who are on facebook; in fact, I’m friends with both of them, but really only communicate with one of them. They each both have current students on their facebooks. However, these teachers are heavily involved in extra-curriculars (choir and theater) and do use their facebooks from time to time to send an encouraging message to the kids. </p>
<p>One of the teachers, I believe has taken FB too far; he’s actually quite immature and leaves cryptic messages about his status/relationship, etc. Everyone pretty much knows he’s gay, and his partner shows up with him from time to time at events, but they never engage in PDA… but, like I said, everyone knows he’s gay, and when he’s having ‘love’ problems, it’s palpable in all aspects of his behavior. The other teacher has been very responsible with the content on his facebook. He has three children, and the oldest, in middle school, is his friend; so he is motivated to keep his site clean. Actually, a lot of the kids also have friended his wife, and their oldest child, too because of the frequent contact they all have due to the extracurricular. </p>
<p>I really think it all depends on how the teacher conducts themselves on facebook.</p>
<p>I’m on FB now as we speak, lol. I work in a public hs & would never be friends with any of the students there, until they graduate. It’s mostly because most adults relate facebook to myspace complete with all of the negative connotations…
Friends with my 20 year old & a few of her friends. My 17 yr old is friends, but none of his hs buddies care to be…fine by me! BTW, I would never “friend” a student, but if they friend me (& are not in my district) great!
PS: I have over 100 friends & I would say 80% are adults…some with quite a few more friends than that!</p>
<p>The “kids” better face facts that the over 40’s are here to stay!</p>
<p>I’ve seen Facebook a handful of times. Its user interface is great & easy to use, although it apparently takes a newer computer to sail through it seamlessly. And both my daughters, 21 & 18, are disciples. It’s the way they communicate.</p>
<p>But that’s where it ends for me. I have not & will not sign up, for numerous reasons. First off, I have better uses for my time than to be lurking/stalking my daughters & their friends, living vicariously through my children. So much of their back-and-forth is kind of inane anyway, typical of teenagers. Secondly, I do respect their privacy, and that has worked well for me so far. And they respect my respect for them.</p>
<p>Maybe I’m the only one, but I have a real problem with school faculty being on Facebook. I suppose purely as a communication device for homework, notifications, etc., it’s all right. But hello, isn’t that what EMail is for? It certainly can be abused, on a number of levels. But kids are increasingly getting P.O.'d that their parents and ‘adults’ are on there, so soon enough they’ll find something else anyway.</p>
<p>At least CC has valuable information!</p>
<p>^^ Facebook has many more uses (for adults) than stalking our kids. It is an important, useful social networking tool and, actually, provides a quick means to update family and friends with news and pictures. I have no problem with school faculty using facebook. They need to be ultra-careful of what they post and share, however. The teachers enjoy keeping up with grads through facebook and vice versa.</p>
<p>My kids’ grandmothers & great aunts & faraway cousins, aunts and uncles are all on facebook. I guess they don’t mind being “stalked” by their loved ones because they have added them as friends!</p>
<p>Don’t get me wrong, most kids don’t like it yet, but they will have to accept it. Mine still think it’s weird, but don’t care because they see the tide changing. My kids know I do my own thing and could care less about what they are doing. </p>
<p>My mother in law, my sister’s mother inlaw, my neices, childhood friends - some as far away as Alaska & Montana, new friends with shared “interests” such as college parents (btw many of us here on CC are friends on FB), bereaved parents, puggle parents, etc. are also counted among my friends through FB. </p>
<p>I don’t feel like I waste a moment of my life either here on CC or on FB, on the contrary, it is an enjoyable part of my day to sip a cup of coffee & chat with family & friends who I might not otherwise have met/spoken to otherwise! </p>
<p>See you over there (eventually) :)</p>
<p>I would love to be facebook friends with some of the regulars here on CC. Please send me a PM if you want my facebook info to friend me!</p>