| ADDRESS | Menlough, Ballinasloe, Co. Galway |
| TELEPHONE | 0909 684663 |
| garballynationalschool@gmail.com | |
| WEBSITE | https://garballyns.ie |
| FAX | |
| SCHOOL NAME | St. Jarlath’s NS |
| DATE OF COMMENCEMENT | 09th October 2020 |
| AUTHOR | Paula Flannery |
Contents
1. Introduction
2. General Approach
3. Content Filtering
4. Web Browsing and Downloading
5. Email and Messaging
6. Social Media
7. Personal Devices
8. Images & Video
9. Cyberbullying
10. School Websites
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General Approach
The aim of this Internet Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) is to ensure that pupils will benefit from the learning opportunities offered by the school’s internet resources in a safe and effective manner.
Internet use and access is considered a school resource and privilege. If the school AUP is not adhered to this privilege may be withdrawn and appropriate sanctions will be imposed.
When using the internet pupils, parents and staff are expected:
- To treat others with respect at all times.
- Not undertake any actions that may bring the school into disrepute.
- Respect the right to privacy of all other members of the school community.
- Respect copyright and acknowledge creators when using online content and resources.
This Acceptable Use Policy applies to pupils who have access to and are users of the internet in St Jarlath’s NS.
- It also applies to members of staff, volunteers, parents, carers and others who access the internet in St Jarlath’s NS.
Misuse of the internet may result in disciplinary action, including written warnings, withdrawal of access privileges, detention and, in extreme cases, suspension or expulsion. The school also reserves the right to report any illegal activities to the appropriate authorities.
St Jarlath’s NS implements the following strategies on promoting safer use of the internet:
- Pupils will be provided with education in the area of internet safety as part of our implementation of the SPHE and CSPE curriculum.
- Teachers will be provided with continuing professional development opportunities in the area of internet safety.
- St Jarlath’s NS participates in Safer Internet Day activities to promote safer more effective use of the internet.
This policy and its implementation will be reviewed annually by the following stakeholders:
- Board of Management, teaching staff, support staff, pupils, and parents
This policy has been developed by a working group including: Principal, Deputy Principal, teachers, pupils, parents/carers, and representatives of the Board of Management.
The school will monitor the impact of the policy using:
- Logs of reported incidents.
Should serious online safety incidents take place, Carmel Hoade should be informed.
The implementation of this Internet Acceptable Use policy will be monitored by Carmel Hoade. Google Classroom and Zoom are the main tools we will use to communicate with pupils remotely. Google Classroom is a file management system which simplifies the collection and distribution of pupil’s work. The teacher is able to compile a collection of documents, videos and resource links into an assignment. The students can view the document, edit the document, or receive a copy of the document depending on the settings set by the teacher. Google Docs are both COPPA and FERPA compliant when using a G Suite account. Google Classroom restricts participation in the environment to staff and students on the domain. Under G Suite students and teachers are given a Google account login that is specific to the school’s domain. Students and teachers would need to be logged into and utilise their G Suite accounts to participate in the Classroom environment. This protects student information from outside users since regular Gmail accounts or other G Suite accounts from different schools could not be added into a teacher’s Classroom
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Content Filtering
St Jarlath’s NS has chosen to implement the following level on content filtering on the Schools Broadband Network:
- Level 5 This level allows access to millions of websites including games and YouTube and allows access to personal websites category, and other similar types of websites, such as blogs but blocks access to websites belonging to the personal websites category and websites such as Facebook belonging to the Social Networking category.
Pupils taking steps to by-pass the content filter by using proxy sites or other means may be subject to disciplinary action, including written warnings, withdrawal of access privileges, detention and, in extreme cases, suspension or expulsion.
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Web Browsing and Downloading
Pupils will not intentionally visit internet sites that contain obscene, illegal, hateful or otherwise objectionable materials.
Pupils will report accidental accessing of inappropriate materials in the classroom to their teacher.
Pupils will report accidental accessing of inappropriate materials in school but outside the classroom to their class teacher.
Pupils and staff will be aware that any usage, including distributing or receiving information, school-related or personal, may be monitored for unusual activity, security and/or network management reasons.
Pupils will use the school’s internet connection only for educational and career development activities.
Pupils will not download or view any material that is illegal, obscene, and defamatory or that is intended to annoy or intimidate another person.
- Use of file sharing and torrent sites is allowed with staff permission.
- Downloading by pupils of materials or images not relevant to their studies is not allowed.
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Email and Messaging
- The use of personal email accounts is only allowed at St Jarlath’s NS with expressed permission from members of the teaching staff.
- Pupils should not use school email accounts to register for online services such as social networking services, apps, and games.
- Pupils will use approved class email accounts only under supervision by or permission from a teacher.
- Pupils should be aware that email communications are monitored.
Pupils will not send any material that is illegal, obscene, and defamatory or that is intended to annoy or intimidate another person.
Pupils should immediately report the receipt of any communication that makes them feel uncomfortable, is offensive, discriminatory, threatening or bullying in nature and must not respond to any such communication.
Pupils should avoid opening emails that appear suspicious. If in doubt, pupils should ask their teacher before opening emails from unknown senders.
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Social Media
The following statements apply to the use of messaging, blogging and video streaming services in St Jarlath’s NS:
- Use of instant messaging services and apps including G Chat etc. is allowed in St Jarlath’s NS with express permission from teaching staff.
- Use of blogs such as Word Press, Tumblr etc is allowed in St Jarlath’s NS with express permission from teaching staff.
- Use of video streaming sites such as YouTube and Vimeo etc. is allowed with express permission from teaching staff.
Staff and pupils must not use social media and the internet in any way to harass, insult, abuse or defame pupils, their family members, staff or other members of St Jarlath’s NS community.
Staff and pupils must not discuss personal information about pupils, staff and other members of the St Jarlath’s NS community on social media.
Staff and pupils must not use school email addresses for setting up personal social media accounts or to communicate through such media.
Staff and pupils must not engage in activities involving social media which might bring St Jarlath’s NS into disrepute.
Staff and pupils must not represent your personal views as those of bring St Jarlath’s NS on any social medium.
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Personal Devices
Pupils using their own technology in school should follow the rules set out in this agreement, in the same way as if they were using school equipment.
The following statements apply to the use of internet-enabled devices such as tablets, gaming devices, and digital music players in St Jarlath’s NS:
- Pupils are only allowed to bring personal internet-enabled devices into St Jarlath’s NS with expressed permission from staff.
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Images & Video
Care should be taken when taking photographic or video images that pupils are appropriately dressed and are not participating in activities that might bring the individuals or the school into disrepute.
At St Jarlath’s NS pupils must not take, use, share, publish or distribute images of others without their permission.
Taking photos or videos on school grounds or when participating in school activities is only allowed with expressed permission from staff.
Written permission from parents or carers will be obtained before photographs of pupils are published on the school website.
Pupils must not share images, videos or other content online with the intention to harm another member of the school community regardless of whether this happens in school or outside.
Sharing explicit images and in particular explicit images of pupils and/or minors is an unacceptable and absolutely prohibited behaviour, with serious consequences and sanctions for those involved. Sharing explicit images of other pupils automatically incurs suspension as a sanction.
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Cyberbullying
When using the internet pupils, parents and staff are expected to treat others with respect at all times.
Engaging in online activities with the intention to harm, harass, or embarrass another pupil or member of staff is an unacceptable and absolutely prohibited behaviour, with serious consequences and sanctions for those involved.
Measures are taken by St Jarlath’s NS to ensure that staff and pupils are aware that bullying is defined as unwanted negative behaviour, verbal, psychological or physical, conducted by an individual or group against another person (or persons) and which is repeated over time. This definition includes cyber-bullying even when it happens outside the school or at night.
The prevention of cyber bullying is an integral part of the anti-bullying policy of our school.
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School Websites
Pupils will be given the opportunity to publish projects, artwork or school work on the internet in accordance with clear policies and approval processes regarding the content that can be loaded to the school’s website.
The website will be regularly checked to ensure that there is no content that compromises the safety, privacy, or reputation of students or staff.
The publication of student work will be coordinated by a teacher.
St Jarlath’s NS will use only digital photographs, audio or video clips focusing on group activities. Content focusing on individual students will only be published on the school website with parental permission.
Personal student information including home address and contact details will not be published on St Jarlath’s NS web pages.
St Jarlath’s NS will avoid publishing the first name and last name of pupils in video or photograph captions published online.
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