Because, Comrade, You're a Dumbass!

Everyone knows the deal with the Eden Prairie Facebook debacle.

The problem I have with these kids is not the drinking. I know, as a teacher I should say, "Hey kids, don't drink...EVER!" That, however, is not going to happen, and I know that.

No, the problem I have with these kids is that they're idiots. In the new world, it's way to easy to find the incriminating evidence online.
These kids, Comrades, are idiots. Let me make that clearer: Hey kids, you're dumbasses!

Athletes: you signed a waiver promising you wouldn't do anything stupid like this...then you get pictures taken.

All of you: you posted pictures. Do you not understand that this goes with you? Let's say you decide to go for a job in a few years. If the company does a background check on you and, oh...I don't know...searches Google, they might come across those images.

What you write, what you post...if it's online, it's out there for the whole world.

You have to be careful, and you idiots, possibly believing that you're untouchable, don't show remorse or brain cells.

You're walkout was also pathetic. I'm not going to beat on the parents, because they should be embarrassed of kids like you who don't understand the true essence of the walkout. You used it as a way to get out of class...and you looked like idiots. Congratulations, those of you in the newspaper should enjoy having that hang over you as you apply to college or go for a job, dude.

A colleague of mine ran into this problem as well. His anonymity gone, his colleagues and students were reading his blog and gossiping about him. Then he made a mistake: he wrote about work. Bam! A colleauge printed some of his work and handed it into the administration who then debated about firing him (it doesn't matter what he wrote, what matters is that he wrote...period). They were afraid.
They're still afraid, except now the fear is less about him talking about the inner workings of his school, and more that he will do something that will make him end up on the front page of the newspaper.

And I know it frustrates him. His first mistake was posting, but his second mistake was appearing in a student's film project for a class. Now his every move is being scrutinized by the administration. He can't talk to the students, and it's making him unhappy.
He's, "just a dirty, old man," or he has, "an inappropriate relationship with the kids."
He stopped writing on his blog, because he was told he would lose his job if he didn't.
He's afraid. Of course, he also told me that he's also unhappy, because he can't fix his students' problems...but that's another story.

This colleague would be the first to tell you that he was a dumbass. He made mistakes.

Learn from what happened to him and from what I'm telling you: whatever you do...if you post it online...then EVERYONE will know. Don't be stupid.

Here endeth the lesson.