Turn the filters off and use Securus

[BatchFile]

After seeing a lecture by Russel Prue of andertontiger.com (and what a lecture it was - if you ever get the chance to see him jump at it), I'm considering recommending turning off the internet filters as far as we can (our LEA has two categories of filtering - one heavier than the other - the lighter one allows youtube and social networking but blocks pr0n) and using an active monitoring system such as Securus instead.

 

Any thoughts?

[plexer]

Local level filtering such as smoothwall is active filtering and that can be set to log everything but not actually block it.

 

Depends on if you have the man power to monitor the systems.

 

Yes having talked with Russel on numerous occassions I don't think we should nanny or baby sit students but then there are aspects of the web that people should be prevented from accessing in a school environment.

 

Ben

[Edu-IT]

You also have to think about network security. Some sites are blocked for a reason.

[SYNACK]

Would you remove the airbags to make your car go faster?

 

I don't get why you would want to loose an extra layer of protection unless it is really causing issues by being unresponsive or something. At that point why not an internal network level system like Smoothwall or Websence.

 

I agree with the whole 'room to fall' learning aspect but it is not only the pupils who are protected by the filters. Without them if anything goes wrong or a student bypassed local security then the school, supervising teacher and even the tech staff can be for it. Why take the chance?

[AngryTechnician]

I know that Brune Park Community College in Gosport do exactly this, because I visited them recently to see their student laptop scheme in action. Not sure if any of their staff are on here but the Deputy Head said there had been very few problems since they made the switch in September.

[muppet]

Isn't there a duty of care issue here?

It wasn't that long ago that the press was full of reports about pupils being able to access an inappropriate image in Leeds (I think?) and parents were asking for heads to roll. Now while this was a primary school they were going on about surely the principle is the same for secondary schools.

 

I think you had better clarify if there is a responsibilty to filter inappropriate stuff from pupils and more importantly who will be held responsible if / when that stuff is accessed and parents / press find out. The finger of blame gets waved around madly with these types of issues and I'd want a big umberella to hide under when the proverbial hits the fan!!!!

[stinkfoot]

I'm not sure I'd like to be the one who has to explain to little Jimmy's parents why he accidently accessed pornographic photographs while searching for pictures of rabbits for his My Favourite Animal project!

[GrumbleDook]

@plexer

Active filtering and active monitoring are two different things.

 

Breakdown time

 

Reactive filtering - a filtering solution that you get in, don't touch really apart from to stick kids on at certain levels and if something gets through or something is blocked (and needed) you ring company x to blacklist / whitelist accordingly.

 

Active filtering - you take control of the filtering system, tweak it to suit your needs, check logs (or have it email you information) on a regulare basis to help you choose how you tweak it. You also work with the different departments to change the filtering before the need arises.

 

Reactive monitoring - having solutions like Securus which track what kids are doing (and staff I suppose) and the negative results are captured to be reviewed after the fact. Stress on the negative results (based on the use of keywords)

 

Active monitoring - the use of classroom management tools such as AB Tutor Control and RM Tutor to look at, and work with, the kids on their computers, sharing the desktop ... allowing students to display and demonstrate work to others, etc.

 

A combination of any two of the above it a good thing, but the best solution is likely to be active-active.

 

To make most use of this you need to help the staff understand limits and boundaries which they need to support the kids with. You need to look at some of the web 2.0 and social networking tools out there to look at the educational benefit.

 

There are a number of good places to look at this ... going over old TeachMeet materials is good, edte.ch is good, EdTechRoundup.com ... and many more.

[BatchFile]

Would you remove the airbags to make your car go faster?

 

I don't get why you would want to loose an extra layer of protection unless it is really causing issues by being unresponsive or something. At that point why not an internal network level system like Smoothwall or Websence.

 

I agree with the whole 'room to fall' learning aspect but it is not only the pupils who are protected by the filters. Without them if anything goes wrong or a student bypassed local security then the school, supervising teacher and even the tech staff can be for it. Why take the chance?

 

Isn't there a duty of care issue here?

It wasn't that long ago that the press was full of reports about pupils being able to access an inappropriate image in Leeds (I think?) and parents were asking for heads to roll. Now while this was a primary school they were going on about surely the principle is the same for secondary schools.

 

I think you had better clarify if there is a responsibilty to filter inappropriate stuff from pupils and more importantly who will be held responsible if / when that stuff is accessed and parents / press find out. The finger of blame gets waved around madly with these types of issues and I'd want a big umberella to hide under when the proverbial hits the fan!!!!

 

I'm not sure I'd like to be the one who has to explain to little Jimmy's parents why he accidently accessed pornographic photographs while searching for pictures of rabbits for his My Favourite Animal project!

 

As I said in passing, the LEA don't provide a totally unfiltered feed at all - even the "unfiltered" one that I'm (blue sky) thinking of connecting the ISA server to has pornography and other unpleasantness blocked, but does allow access to social networking, forums etc., which is where I see Securus's keyword based monitoring and capturing completing the loop.

[dayzd]

Reactive monitoring - having solutions like Securus which track what kids are doing (and staff I suppose) and the negative results are captured to be reviewed after the fact. Stress on the negative results (based on the use of keywords)

Relying on Securus for your in-house monitoring (beyond your LEAs basic filtering) begs the question: just how much time have you got?

 

We have a Securus box and the amount of false positives it provides is staggering. I look through hundreds of screenshots on it daily, and besides pupils using coarse language in emails to each other, there's very rarely anything that needs any follow-up.

It's library of words and phrases is so huge, and the client is so thorough (it captures Photoshop Elements 'Touch up' button as 'touch u' SOOO many times a day... Kids typing 'wog won' in emails to each other is flagged as racist, and I'd bet most of our kids couldn't tell you why), it demands a serious amount of time to review it all.

 

Now I know you can turn down its tenaciousness, but in the years we've had it, we've seen need for it to flag everything. (We had an incident where certain things were being flagged, and upon further investigation we found many more that were of lower weighting that we would have otherwise missed.)

 

The other thing to remember about blocking social networking sites and youtube etc, beyond inappropriate content, is that it help keeps pupils on task - how much real work do you think would get done if kids could sneakily play Farmville at the back of the class?

[GrumbleDook]

Yep ... and that is why my preference is active-active ... it pushes the onus back towards classroom management and less on the technology.

[BatchFile]

Relying on Securus for your in-house monitoring (beyond your LEAs basic filtering) begs the question: just how much time have you got?

 

We have a Securus box and the amount of false positives it provides is staggering. I look through hundreds of screenshots on it daily, and besides pupils using coarse language in emails to each other, there's very rarely anything that needs any follow-up.

It's library of words and phrases is so huge, and the client is so thorough (it captures Photoshop Elements 'Touch up' button as 'touch u' SOOO many times a day... Kids typing 'wog won' in emails to each other is flagged as racist, and I'd bet most of our kids couldn't tell you why), it demands a serious amount of time to review it all.

 

Now I know you can turn down its tenaciousness, but in the years we've had it, we've seen need for it to flag everything. (We had an incident where certain things were being flagged, and upon further investigation we found many more that were of lower weighting that we would have otherwise missed.)

 

The other thing to remember about blocking social networking sites and youtube etc, beyond inappropriate content, is that it help keeps pupils on task - how much real work do you think would get done if kids could sneakily play Farmville at the back of the class?

 

How big's your school?

I only ask as this is very much at the (pre)feasibility study stage at the moment:) (hence it being in the Blue Skies forum)

Edited March 18, 2010 by BatchFile

[dayzd]

We're a pretty large secondary. 1300-ish pupils, a little under 700 workstations.

 

However, our Securus box is only lisenced for 300 clients, so not all machines report back efficiently - as far as I can tell it gets a little 'first come, first served', and if a machine hasn't sent it's logs for a while, it ends up dumping a few days worth in one go.

 

It still needs regular checking (I tend to keep a tab open for it in FF), it just means sometimes you get 20 violations/hr and sometimes 200...

[JJonas]

We're a pretty large secondary. 1300-ish pupils, a little under 700 workstations.

 

However, our Securus box is only lisenced for 300 clients, so not all machines report back efficiently - as far as I can tell it gets a little 'first come, first served', and if a machine hasn't sent it's logs for a while, it ends up dumping a few days worth in one go.

 

It still needs regular checking (I tend to keep a tab open for it in FF), it just means sometimes you get 20 violations/hr and sometimes 200...

 

You can get the maximum client load from the front panel of the securus box

[webman]

Is it really our responsibility to monitor the likes of Securus? I would suggest it's more to do with the behaviour/pastoral side of things.

[mortstar]

Is it really our responsibility to monitor the likes of Securus? I would suggest it's more to do with the behaviour/pastoral side of things.

 

Definitely the right forum for this

[timzim]

Active filtering - you take control of the filtering system, tweak it to suit your needs, check logs (or have it email you information) on a regular basis to help you choose how you tweak it. You also work with the different departments to change the filtering before the need arises.

 

Reactive monitoring - having solutions like Securus which track what kids are doing (and staff I suppose) and the negative results are captured to be reviewed after the fact. Stress on the negative results (based on the use of keywords)

 

With Securus you take control of its filtering (you can choose what you filter), tweak it to suit your needs & check the logs reularly to help you choose how you tweak it. Doesn't that then put it into the Active Filtering category?

[mortstar]

No, because whatever hits you get back have already happened, you are reacting to what has happened. With active filtering the 'problem' is stopped before it occurs, i.e. is (pro)active.

[timzim]

But some of what Securus does is also pro-active - it can block websites, for example.

[BatchFile]

Is it really our responsibility to monitor the likes of Securus? I would suggest it's more to do with the behaviour/pastoral side of things.

 

That depends on your job description I suppose; as I'm also E-Safety Coordinator, then yes, it probably should be.

Edited March 18, 2010 by BatchFile

[Face-Man]

Ofsted have recently reported that pupils are safer using a less restricted internet and learning how to manage risk.

 

Students safest using the internet when they are trusted to manage their own risk / News / Ofsted home / Ofsted - Ofsted

 

Obviously there is stuff that need to be banned from schools but from my experience a lot of stuff is blocked because it more entertaining than lessons. This then using a sledgehammer to crack a nut these students that are off task need to see there are consequences for the choices they make and so if they access facebook for example when they should be working actions are taken like they would be in a work place.

 

I often use the analogy of a swimming pool for the use of the internet. Water is dangerous so there are rules ie no running. When you first start you are in the protected shallow end with arm bands but ultimately you are taught to swim. There are life guards on hand ie: CEOPS or school staff.

 

Schools need to stop just dipping there toe in the water and teach the students the skill they need to use the internet responsibly.

[dayzd]

You can get the maximum client load from the front panel of the securus box

The web interface is telling me Clients / Licensed Clients: 256 / 300 .

 

Is it really our responsibility to monitor the likes of Securus? I would suggest it's more to do with the behaviour/pastoral side of things.

I can see your point, but at the same time, it picks up security violations like hacking and use of web-proxies - something that is best, and easiest, handled by us. (Plus, that's just how things work here. It has a plug = ICT look after it.)

 

Either way, someone has to monitor it - if it's you or your student support officer, it takes somebody's time.

[danieldainty]

Hi,

 

Ofsted have recently reported that pupils are safer using a less restricted internet and learning how to manage risk ... Schools need to stop just dipping there toe in the water and teach the students the skill they need to use the internet responsibly.

 

I completely agree.

 

I've seen both sides of the fence and work for two schools that have opposing filtering views. Both schools are ten minutes away from each other and are on the LGfL/Synetrix filtering system.

 

School A blocks everything - youtube, social networking (facebook, twitter, other chat), porn, and hacking. Basically everything on a category that the network manager* thinks is inappropriate. No Securus system in place. No reporting, no logs. Just blocks.

 

School B blocks only porn, hacking and (recently) facebook. Twitter is okay, games are fine, web chat is permitted, but Securus is in place and actively alerts direct to SLT when a student breaches the enforced AUP which says no games during lesson time, three strikes and you're out, etc etc.

 

The difference is in School A the network manager decided what to block and what not to block, and the SLT have thought that there is no changing it. Teachers complain that schemes of work are difficult because youtube et al is locked up, but the SLT have not thought to tackle the issue and change it.

 

School B, the kids use their iPhones (and others) on the school wireless (dirty network), use social networking (except Facebook, which was deemed disruptive to lessons/learning spaces) to research trends and exchange ideas, and work with the local CLC on an iPhone project and were featured on BBC News with world-reaching publicity and offers of knowledge exchange, feee iPhone apps, and so on. In fact you may know who that school is as they've been in the press for the project.

 

I think that any school could change to an open model, providing

1. it's monitored
   
2. any breaches of AUP are reacted upon
   
3. the students (AND staff) know that monitoring is in place
   
4. users have the opportunity to explain/apologise for a possible breach
   

 

I'd recommend any school to try it. But as it is usually an about-face on filtering/monitoring, it must be done by explaining to the kids the benefits, the reasons why, about safe use, and the consequences of over-stepping the mark (and then actually following up on them!).

 

D

Edited March 31, 2010 by danieldainty
Attributed Face-Man

[billjenkins]

Definitely the right forum for this

 

This is such an emotive issue. In my experience every adult has a responsibility for e-safety but of course 'every adult' can't have access to the data for a multiplicity of reasons. However, the summary is this; Securus and other similar software has information of use to different people, each of whom have a duty of care. So as far as we're concerned when installing or training we advise as follows;

 

1) Network security and control issues such as proxy bypass and hacking are the role of the Network Professionals who need to know who's breaching or attempting to breach audit or security policies. The information can then be used to adjust policies and improve the network.

2) Pastoral care issues are the responsibility of the SMT who should 'elect' nominated individuals who know the students to receive the automated email alerts and scheduled reports upon which they should act. This includes regularly logging in to ensure they are reviewing captures and taking appropriate safety and disciplinary measures as necessary.

 

Largely and with regret, we know that in 'most' schools the job is foisted on the Network Team who are expected to trawl through the captures and present the staff with the most serious issues. It is often a battle to get the SMT engaged in the actual monitoring but with the latest report from Ofsted (Feb 2010) and their new e-safety inspections (from Sept 2009), schools are taking a more pragmatic and realistic view of their responsibilites. The drum banging is far from over but at least there's some progress!

 

Happy Easter all