Teen & Family Life Coach
I am making a response to a blog I came across today. Please visit to read the blog in which I am mentioned.
http://www.scribbal.com/2011/08/study-35-of-teachers-abused-through-facebook-and-youtube/
I find this alarming and deeply concerning to our profession of Educators. After hearing about the attack and murder of a middle school Principal in Memphis, TN a couple of weeks ago, then reading this article concerns me that teenagers are starting to take things into their own hands and I think it is reason to be concerned.
First, I am a huge fan of teachers, educators, and any profession that involves working with teenagers. Thank you to everyone that serves this population.
What concerns me is that any teacher or staff member can be “Teacher of the Year” one moment and on paid administrative leave the next. All an angry student needs to do is say, “Mr. or Miss so and so made me feel uncomfortable as he or she looked at me in a weird way.” Then there is an investigation and said person on administrative leave ultimately costing them a career. This is another example of “The Power” being turned over. A student can post something on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc. They can make crazy remarks on websites such as www.RateMyTeachers.com and unfortunately an investigation has to take place.
Last year, I was the victim of Facebook and online trolling or cyber bullying you can call it. I spoke at a high school in upstate New York and I will maintain a level of professionalism and refrain from naming the school. I have spoken at this school every year for about five years. Two teenagers wanted to be funny and they caused about six months of heartache, headache, and ultimately a lot of stress in my family. They made threats to my family including “Finding my family and I murdered with gun shot casings all over the motorhome.” They made sexual threats about my daughters and my wife. It was far worse than you can imagine.
As a result, I blocked them from my fan page (www.Facebook.com/JeffYaldenFanPage). However, that doesn’t mean that others couldn’t see their posts and their replies to anyone that wrote on my page. Finally, after months and months of their consistent abuse I decided to respond and copied every post and every day I started my day with sending their posts to the local police of this community, every person on the school board, the superintendent, principals, assistant principals, guidance counselors, and teachers. For weeks, I made sure everyone knew what was going on because prior to this they weren’t taking it seriously.
The problem is that none of their threats were illegal. According to New York State Law, I was informed that the legality of their actions weren’t punishable my New York State Law and therefore there was nothing that could have been done. The police were involved, local media outlets, administrators, and hundreds of students in this particular school were outraged at what a select few kids were doing and the harm they were causing.
The bottom line as a result of this is a huge lesson learned and the response to the article I posted a link to.
In my experience, having gone through one of the hardest professional experiences of my life, the best way to address this is to ignore it. The same as we tell a 14 year old who is getting bullied, “Ignore them!” How do you expect an 8 – 17 year old who is seeking acceptance to just ignore people when they’re made fun of? It is nearly impossible when they don’t have the right amount of self-esteem. However, we must teach them that ignoring it is the best way for it to end quickly and here is why.
Simply put, when you show it is bothering you or getting to you it fuels the fire and ignites them further because they know they are getting a rise out of you. That is for teens. My post is for teachers and professionals of education.
If a student(s), want to write or make a video about you and you can find the source, do not respond at all. Copy and document everything you possibly can. Take it immediately to the authorities, school administration, and let them handle it accordingly. If you respond you are fueling the fire and going to ignite an all out war in which you will not win. Online trolls are relentless and will destroy you. They will destroy you because they will stop at nothing!
It took me months to put an end to it and I promised myself that I wouldn’t get emotionally caught up in what they were doing. This is my facebook fan page and my fans they were attacking – www.Facebook.com/JeffYaldenFanPage. Finally, when they went to attack my family, my daughters, threaten murder, etc. that was too much for me to ignore. It ended when a big newspaper article came out and one of the boys made a comment about him being suicidal. That is when finally a threat was made and police then had a right to take action. I’ve heard very little since, but I continue to ignore every person from this school because I don’t want gas to ignite the flames anymore. This happens to be the one school I will never visit again. I was really disappointed in the role the administration took in handling this and I think in the end if you ask them, they learned a lesson too.
So, in short, I encourage all professionals, teachers, administrators, and coaches that work with teens who become a victim of teens and their games to ignore them and do not respond. We are at the very beginning of what is to come as teens start to feel the power of the internet.
Better yet, during our advisory periods in schools we should all have knowledge of teens and the internet and we should spend some time talking about what teens are doing and how it can effect them and their reputation. How teens handle themselves on the internet and what they post online such as facebook, twitter, youtube, etc. Let’s educate them and teach them that what is out there is permanent and can come back to you.
The legal ramifications are going to catch up and include the internet. I don’t think we are there yet, but I also don’t think we are far from it.
Schools need to clamp down on what their teens are doing online. If we don’t address this in schools and at home it is going to increase and ultimately take more lives such as murder or even suicide. This is not an issue to be taken lightly.
We are professionals and mature. We know how to ignore and walk away. We know how to “NOT RESPOND!”, but how about a 13 or 14 year old child? I guarantee you that if a 13 or 14 year old child had been the victim or what I went through in September through February of 2011, I am not sure they would have been able to handle it.
Please read the article, pass the word, and let’s make a statement that these actions won’t be tolerated.
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Jeff Yalden is a teen and family expert. He travels the country as one of the most sought after teen and youth motivational speakers in America today. For more information about Jeff Yalden, please visit www.JeffYalden.com or www.JeffYaldenLifeCoaching.com.
Jeff Yalden 