So, last week I wrote a heart-felt post about how much I love teaching and appreciate the students I have in my class. I’m not one who necessarily enjoys disclosing my thoughts and feelings, so the fact I shared that blog post on Facebook was a big deal to me. I wanted everyone to know how blessed I feel to be doing what I am doing with so many cool people.
I felt pretty good after I posted it. I got some positive responses from family and friends, and the few students who I am Facebook friends with “liked” my post or even commented on it. I was glad that I used that opportunity to share with everyone how I was feeling, because it is not something I would normally do.
However….. about thirty minutes after I posted it on Sunday night, my good friend, Bryson, sent me these screenshots:
I’m not going to lie; initially I was very flattered. My teaching confidence received about a 200% boost. I got on my computer and found the “SUU Confessions” Facebook pages and was kind of amazed/shocked of what I was reading. These pages are outlets for people to post anonymously any thought, feeling, or story without fear of repercussion. While I was a student at BYU-Idaho, there was some controversy surrounding the “BYUI Secrets” page, but that was mainly because BYU-Idaho has such a strict honor code and students were anonymously posting about getting drunk and having sex. The “SUU Confessions” pages here are not looked at nearly as scandalous because none of that type of behavior is forbidden by SUU.
A humorous conversation between Bryson and I ensued, mainly consisting of us figuring out ways he could pass as my little brother, but then I began to feel a little weird, and frankly, kind of disappointed. This was definitely not anything that had ever crossed my mind before.
I know what you are thinking, “Oh boo-hoo. Poor Hayden, one of his students has a crush on him. Why is his life so hard?”
It’s not like that. After these posts sunk in for a little bit, I began to think that maybe I was failing somehow as a teacher. I wondered how these posts would make my wife feel about me going to work everyday. Would she ever be comfortable when I spend time with my class, all of my students whom I genuinely love, or would she always be concerned about it? What if this student said something to the wrong person? It could cause my family serious grief and even damage my career.
In my class we have studied mediated communication, which is the technology that enables us to communicate with others without physically being in the same place. Mediated communication channels include social media, cell phones, Skype or Facetime, etc. Mediated communication is a wonderful tool that can enrich our social lives when used properly, but it also has a few challenges. Two frequent problems with mediated communication are disinhibition, which refers to transmitting a message without considering its consequences, and permanence, which means that digital messages can be (and are) archived forever.
In this scenario, disinhibition is an issue because my admiring student was clearly not thinking when she (or maybe he…) posted those messages. Permanence becomes an issue because these messages are still posted online.
I was tempted to respond to the postings, mainly to just be funny, but I held back. I was hoping that other “confessions” would be posted, which would cause these ones to disappear from the timeline. Unfortunately, they didn’t. When I got to work on Monday, my bosses and coworkers had a fun time with it. But more importantly, the first thing one of my students said to me in class was, “Hey, Coombs have you seen the confessions page recently?” Of course in that moment, every single one of my students who had not seen the postings got on their phones and pulled it up. Permanence. Great.
In the long run, I know none of this will matter. I know everyone will forget about these silly postings. They were probably just a joke by one of my male students. I guess, more than anything, it was the timing that bugged me because it was literally moments after I let my class know how much they mean to me that these postings were revealed.
I guess next semester I will have to spend more time teaching about the issues associated with mediated communication. At least I will have a great object lesson to go with it.
Hayden Coombs 