Mundelein High School teachers start term with new e-mail rules

Mundelein High School teachers are starting the new term this week with fresh rules for communicating electronically with students.

District 120 employees should only use their official school e-mail addresses to communicate with students, the rules state. Using personal e-mail accounts is forbidden, as is playing online games with students and friending students on social media websites such as Facebook.

Text messaging is frowned upon but not expressly banned. Conversely, teachers are encouraged to communicate with students and parents about grades, attendance and other matters through a school-sanctioned program called PowerSchool.

Mundelein High is the latest school to enact such rules. Staffers at Libertyville and Vernon Hills high schools received identical orders this past spring.

Although the technology is relatively new, the goal isn't, said Melinda Selbee, the general counsel for the Illinois Association of School Boards. Ensuring barriers exist between students and their teachers to prevent inappropriate relationships is a "perennial" issue for school administrators, she said.

"This is an extension (of that)," Selbee said.

The Mundelein High School District 120 board publicly reviewed the rules Tuesday night. They already have been enacted by the administration and did not require a board vote.

The rules are identical to a the policy enacted in neighboring Libertyville-Vernon Hills Area High School District 128. Both districts are represented by the same attorney, Lynn Himes.

They apply to teachers, administrators, coaches and all other District 120 employees. Board members are included, too.

The policy singles out Facebook and Twitter as possible problem areas.

"A good question that staff members should ask themselves before posting or e-mailing a message is, 'Would I mind it (if) that information appeared on the front page of the local newspaper?'" the policy reads. "If the answer is 'yes,' then do not post it."

Selbee said she was unaware of other districts with electronic-communications rules but said her agency doesn't keep data on such matters.

Mundelein High hasn't had any situations involving students and teachers who have had inappropriate communications via e-mail or the Internet, but schools elsewhere in the country have, board member Karen Havlik said.

It's important for Mundelein High to be proactive and enact the policy before problems arise, she said.

"We wanted to be at the front end of it," Havlik said.

Fellow board member Vicky Kennedy backed the new policy, too.

"There are so many areas ... that you can get yourself into trouble (on the Internet)," she said. "It just protects all the parties involved - the staff and the students."

The policy will be posted on the school's website, mundeleinmustangs.com, officials said.