Most students at Blind Brook agree that schools should not block websites, but there are a few people who think it is a good way to increase focus in classrooms. When it comes to this topic there are many things to consider. While at school it is important to work on education, but social media websites will hinder the ability to focus, but while at school you are also meant to socialize and these websites can boost this. Also, many websites that have been blocked, because they have been deemed distracting can be used as tools in a student’s education.
Many students agree that having access to many websites can cause distractions and waver a student’s attention from their school work to video games. All students agree that this can be avoided with a fair internet policy. The part students disagree on is what this should be. Sometimes people can find ways around the websites being blocked and play the same game on another site, or find a different source of entertainment. This makes many students feel that blocking websites isn’t a good enough policy to avoid distractions. Currently, this is the system our school has and sometimes useful websites are blocked. A lot of students have experienced a moment where they needed a certain website for an assignment, but the restrictions put in place restricted them from doing this work. This made the assignment overly difficult and might have decreased the work’s quality.
Students have ideas on what they believe would be a good policy. One idea was to have a strike system. When the digital rules Blind Brook has been broken three times that student loses the privilege of using a device for the rest of the quarter. This means that students would have to do all the work on paper. Another student thought of a policy where certain websites are blocked during class time, but during a free period, lunch, or when doing schoolwork at home there is no website restriction. Another idea was throughout a few students, and it is the same as what we have now, but more lenient. Under this policy, if a website can be educational it wouldn’t be blocked.
Teachers have similar opinions to the students when it comes to school devices. Teachers at Blind Brook recognize that getting rid of distracting websites doesn’t ensure the focus of students. A student can get distracted by anything. Many teachers believe that students should have access to websites like YouTube. Ms. Jesnes thinks, “Platforms like YouTube have valuable educational content. However, there needs to be clear guidelines and supervision to prevent distractions.” Most people at Blind Brook agree that there should be some sort of limitations when students are using websites on their school devices.