CDW-Government: School Cyber Security Down
The good news is that American public schools have considerably improved in terms of physical safety. The bad news is that when it comes to cyber security, American public schools have regressed by 25 percent. These were the findings presented by the CDW-Government in its annual School Safety Index report. This year’s School Safety Index was released on Monday.
Before we talk more about the findings, what is CDW-Government and the School Safety Index anyway? For those who have not heard of them before, here is a short description from their web site:
Now in its second year, the CDW-G School Safety Index provides a nationwide, first-hand view of school safety issues from the perspective of over 400 district IT and security directors.
Based on eight indicators (strengths) and four contraindicators (challenges), survey respondents evaluated and assessed their districts’ cyber and physical security measures, highlighting strong school safety program elements, as well as the barriers to school safety.
If you want to find out more about the Index – the indicators and contraindicators – I suggest that you visit their web site. The concepts are explained quite well there.
So anyhow, what are we supposed to do with these findings? Or maybe, how are we supposed to react?
I would say that a 39% increase in overall physical safety is quite a good thing. After all the violent incidents we have witnessed in the previous years and after all the hullabaloo that various sectors have raised about school safety, it is comforting to know that something concrete has been done about the physical safety of our children in schools.
However, I find it disappointing that the issue of cyber safety has been left behind. It might have been better if the figures had remained where they were but a 25 percent drop is quite alarming, isn’t it? After that news about the Missouri teenager who committed suicide (apparently because of online harassment), I don’t think that there should be doubts as to the potential dangers of the cyber world.
Lest I be misunderstood, let me say clearly that I am not against the Internet for school children. I do, however, think that we should not ignore possible dangers to our children just because the Internet is a virtual world. As much as we try to protect our children physically, we should also do the same for the virtual counterpart, don’t you think?
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Posted on May 21st, 2008 by Deborah J Thomas
Filed under: Administrators, High School, Internet, News, People Involved, School Grade Level, School Safety Issues, Security
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