Feds, teachers to stalk your kids on Facebook now?

When did the Department of Education become the Department of Speech Monitoring? Add the Dept of Ed to the list of Obama agencies that need to be reined in, hard and fast.

Education Department officials are threatening school principals with lawsuits if they fail to monitor and curb students’ lunchtime chat and evening Facebook time for expressing ideas and words that are deemed by Washington special-interest groups to be harassment of some students.

There has only been muted opposition to this far-reaching policy among the professionals and advocates in the education sector, most of whom are heavily reliant on funding and support from top-level education officials. The normally government-averse tech-sector is also playing along, and on Mar. 11, Facebook declared that it was “thrilled” to work with White House officials to foster government oversight of teens’ online activities.

The only formal opposition has come from the National School Board Association, which declined to be interviewed by The DC.

It’s no great surprise that federal bureaucrats, Facebook, and the ACLU are on board with this. But…the teachers’ unions are fine with teachers and administrators being put in legal jeopardy for what kids do on Facebook, on their own time? Really?

Even creepier than the policy itself, is who has been charged with overseeing it.

The leading advocate for the expanded rules is Kevin Jennings, who heads the Education Department’s Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools.

Jennings’ is a name that just keeps popping up in the Obama era. He ran that White House bullying summit last week. As Zombie wrote at the time, Jennings brings quite a history to the field of education — a history that includes child porn in the classroom, failing to report a child predator, and proclaiming to have been inspired by NAMBLA’s Harry Hay.  Quite a history the so-called “safe schools” czar has brought to the table. Now he’s advocating that your kids’ teachers Facebook stalk your kids.

And the teachers’ unions have nothing to say about this? Don’t the teachers; unions have teachers a) who will wind up in court over this, and b) kids in school who may end up running afoul of whatever insane rules the likes of Kevin Jennings comes up with?