Update: Good news, false alarm, I just received this email from the Helix High teacher:
comment: It is no longer blocked. Initially they told me it’s because it’s a “personal website”. But then it works again.
One of Bernie Dodge’s alumni (now a teacher at Helix High) of his graduate course, EDTEC, has left a discouraging comment on this post:
Oh, a little weird thing. I used to read my blog at the school during my prep, and often I am reading other teaching blogs and such. Well, today I discover they’ve blocked all .blogspot accounts.
I emailed our tech guy and he says these are “personal websites” and will no longer be accessible. Frankly, I think that stinks…what if I wanted to use blogs. Schools can be so picky.
Like Bernie, this is the first time I have heard of a public school blocking access to all Blogger powered weblogs. This blocks both students and teachers from valuable Blogger powered resources like the South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami Blog.
Furthermore, as Bernie himself has been stressing in his classes for quite some time and as has been documented, weblogging can be a powerful educational tool which Helix High’s computer class could obviously benefit from.
Alas, it was a false alarm at Helix but all’s still not right in the world. In my Saturday class about edublogging that ended yesterday, a teacher from Orange County reported that his school does block everything from blogspot.com. Why? Because blogs are just for entertainment, and we certainly wouldn’t want schools to have any of that!
We certainly wouldn’t want schools to find out that their perfect world is full of imperfections, nor would we want them to know how their teachers or potential teachers are feeling. However, there is that looming threat of being fired or dismissed for your right of freedom of speech.
I’m still very cautious about what I say, and if I do say anything, it would probably be in code. Aaahhh, but I still miss that wonderful, edgy, critical blog I created in your class! One of my friends had you for EDTEC, and she said when you lectured about the dangers of blogging, and what happened to a certain student, she knew who you were talking about.