Taking the fight to facebook!

So I posted on the school facebook page. My first comment on the newsletter was deleted within 2 minutes of posting it (now that is efficient, considering it was on a Friday evening!), so I had to re-add it. The comment asking why we are giving a religious group access to the kids was in response to a notice in the school newsletter where the school was telling parents that Bible in Schools classes are about to re-start. If you haven’t seen it, there is a picture of it on this page.

This blog is part of a story about my experience with religious education in my Daughter’s school. If you missed the start of it, you can find the beginning here.

So far there is no response from the school. However, I predict that they will try and avoid the issue (I was right!) instead of dealing with it. I’ve also emailed Hira Gage again (sorry Hira!).

While I’ve been writing this, I got a notification that the school had posted something about “guidelines” but when I clicked on it, I got this…

Then later on, there was another notification linking to the school’s “Facebook page guidelines” (see below). I guess the previous ones weren’t draconian enough! Lots of rules about not asking any questions that they might consider to not be positive or “dream stealing” (ok, that’s my addition). Still, no response to my question about the classes though as I guess their new #3 clause allows them to not respond as I’m being a dream-stealer who doesn’t agree with them and #4 rules out any responses anyway!

I’ve seen this thing a lot on Facebook community pages. The admin is able to run them as if they were a feudal kingdom, with absolute power to decapitate anyone who steps out of line. I once challenged the legitimacy of a psychic who was offering to contact dead relatives for a bargain price (couldn’t help myself) and was booted off a local community page!

Thank you for connecting with us on the Xxxxxxxxxx school Facebook page.

Our school’s Facebook page allows our community to stay up to date with school activities. Accessing and commenting on the Xxxxxxxxxx School Facebook page indicates you have read, understood and accepted our Facebook Page Guidelines as set out below.

Xxxxxxxxxx School Facebook Page Guidelines:

This page has been set up to share details about the happenings at Xxxxxxxxxx School. To ensure this page is a positive reflection of the great things happening at our school we ask you respect our Facebook Page Guidelines.

1. Facebook users who have ‘Liked’ our page are able to comment on the school’s posts and events. Users are not able to author a post of their own or load media such as video or photos.

2. We do not endorse children under the Facebook age threshold of 13 years creating their own Facebook accounts. We encourage parents to share our page with their children through their accounts and to use our Facebook page as a role model for communication through social media.

3. Any feedback and comments need to be respectful and contribute in a positive and constructive manner. Should you wish to bring a concern to the school’s attention this should be done by contacting the school directly to ensure we are able to deal with this matter in a timely and appropriate manner.

4. The school will not respond directly to requests or messages on Facebook. If you need to contact the school, please speak to your child’s teacher, call us directly on 09 xxx xxxx or email: office@Xxxxxxxxxx.school.nz

5. You may use names in posts when you wish to make a positive acknowledgement. Where students are named they should be referred to by their first name only. We wish our Facebook page to be used to build spirit and for ‘patting someone on the back’ publicly as we believe it goes a long way towards building a positive school and community.

6. As the page administrators we reserve the right to remove any content which we deem to be in breach of these Facebook Page Guidelines. This includes discriminatory, illegal, obscene or misleading/fraudulent comments, spam or any content which may break intellectual property laws.

7. Should you fail to comply with the Facebook Page Guidelines you may be banned from the Xxxxxxxxxx School Facebook Page.

Find out what I did after the school blocked all discussion on their facebook page…