Before the age of social media, students might have insulted each other by passing notes or writing on walls, Principal Jim Greene said. Social media, however, is the modern wall – and it’s not going away anytime soon.
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The student decided to take his Instagram page down.
The student’s page had about 100 followers, and not all of them were Almira students – some were his friends from other schools. Mr. Greene said he first heard of these social media “shade pages” about two-and-a-half years ago, and he has discovered that multiple districts across the area have encountered them, as well.
Though that student took his Instagram page down on his own accord, Almira is limited in its ability to compel Instagram to remove pages that the school finds troubling, Mr. Greene said. What Almira can control, though, is educating students about using social media in a positive way, he said. Now, with social media, information can be revealed to thousands of people outside of the school’s orbit.