I want to express the social media policy of mine to provide a moment of serendipity regarding use of Instagram and other social media tools that I possess. Traditionally, teachers have avoided connecting with students through social media channels. For the most part, this meant not accepting friend requests from students on Facebook, but totally engaging with them through tweets, blog comments and other platforms that cultivate as teaching and learning spaces.

When I first began working for PWCS, I too felt that it may seem inappropriate to accept friend requests and followers from students even though they initiated the contact. I felt responsible as an adult to keep my personal life out of their business to avoid situations that could draw questions about my professionalism. However, my view soon changed when some students were able to find my Instagram account @Andrew_Tiamo and started to follow me on social media. Enough of those students connected with me that it must have alerted other students, so there was sort of a chain reaction that spread across my follows and followers. I have always kept my account public because I am a firm believer that I have nothing to hide and that I have a lot of share with the world the same way celebrities have the right to do. I have over 13,000 thousand followers from all around the world the minority of which are past or current students. Every day I get hundreds and sometimes even thousands of notifications per day that I have no way to keep track of who follows or likes my publications as Instagram will only show the last 100 notifications.

A couple of weeks ago students started mentioning to me that they had found my Instagram profile, I was excited, yet also terrified. Despite having no control over their actions of who they decide to follow on social media, I still feel like I am their teacher. Being that our relationship was forged within that context, I probably will always feel that way.

I believe that it is important as educators to openly discuss the use of social media considering that 95% of teens are online, according to the Pew Research Internet Projects National Survey of Teens and Parents, and 81% use social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat. It is understandable that technology is a convenient way for teachers to connect with students. Therefore, it is not only important but necessary that students be taught the difference between personal and professional digital communications, says Jennifer Beaver, a teacher at South Carolina Virtual Charter School, “the same way students treat their teachers differently than their friends in a face-to-face conversation.” Openly sharing ourselves with students lets them understand us as people and helps to strengthen the connections we have with them. If students and teachers are deeply invested in one another’s interests and general well being, it supports a strong teaching and learning relationship as well. Most importantly, opening up our personal channels provides an amazing opportunity for informal learning. It’s hard to predict when informal learning could take place, but sharing openly is the only way to encourage it. As teachers, we work to be role models and that should not stop the minute the school day ends. It is our job to forge professional relationships with our students and to adapt to changes in networking provided by social media.

This brings me to my next point, integrity, the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness. As a substitute, I have had the pleasure to teach at many schools, from grades 6 to 12 which has allowed me to meet many students from all backgrounds. Since I am in my early twenties I always allowed the students to call me by my first name, Andrew. I have refrained from using my last name because this way it has helped me connect closer to the students and made my teaching a lot more pleasant as students can relate to me and I to them.

Like I mentioned earlier, I believe in complete transparency, many social issues would be solved and even avoided if we did live in hiding. So through the lens of informal learning spaces, I look at my use of social media as a chance to interact with people from across the globe including former and current students. Some publications can lead to content based interactions and learning experiences but also students can have the opportunity to congratulate me on having recently earned my Bachelor’s degree in engineering or expressing their sympathies on the passing of my grandfather. All these things may or may not be content based interactions but they are chances to practice their social skills within the context of real human experience. I highly encourage the use of social media because it stores all messages sent in case the administration feels the need to review them. But teachers are often too worried about getting fired over misunderstanding and I ask that you consider all the pros that social media has to offer. It is true that there is a lot of bad things on the internet and the internet hosts people that are bad influence to kids. However, it is up us, educators, to show a new and more friendly side so that there can be more good role models to follow on the internet. In this fashion, we can form closer bonds to our students, create learning relationships, and passively monitor to ensure that their behavior is healthy.