Teachers in need of instruction?

Thanks Jeff for pointing out this story about a teacher who somehow thought it was a good idea to send naked photos of herself to a 15-year-old student!

I find this incident very hard to wrap my head around. Outside of the obvious inappropriateness of the act, did the teacher honestly think that a teenage boy would keep naked pictures of a teacher a secret? Imagine being in high school and getting a hold of some compromising pics of a teacher. Imagine your classmates getting their hands on them. What percentage of them would just keep those photos to themselves as opposed to having some sort of "fun" with them?

That's what I thought.

I was in Teacher Education for a while, and I don't recall ever covering the inappropriateness of sexual relationships with students. I am sure it was covered elsewhere, but not in the classes I taught. Perhaps during those ethics classes (or wherever they talk about such issues) we need to address the fact that sexting counts as acting inappropriately? Show news stories such as this to scare the heck out of those even tempted to do so? Again, I find it odd that it would even be necessary, but given the viral nature of texts and other digital communication, perhaps it wouldn't hurt to offer these gentle reminders to instructors.

Update on blog management

Hi folks! Just so you know, I have now defaulted to moderating all comments in order to block spamming, which has gotten out of control. Mind you, I WILL post all comments that are sincere, even if they are just to say you liked the post or want to say "hi."

I also implemented a mandatory typing of a word to avoid macros as spam.

Thanks to all of you for your patience in this matter. Now, on to our regularly scheduled programming :-).