Miguel Guhlin today called me a hypocrite. In an earlier post about social networking sites, I had recommended that teachers on the job market get rid of their facebook pages. I stand by what I wrote before because I know school administrators that use facebook to screen out potential teachers. Now, the policy person in me agree's with Miguel's post 100% and when I wrote my post on social networking, I can tell you that the policy and technology advocate in me was cringing. But, I wrote it all the same because that's who I am.
Now, I like a good argument and I don't really mind being called a hypocrite, even on one of the top 25 edublogs. It sort of comes with the territory. In fact, I am happy someone is paying enough attention to the blog to call me out on something.
But, even though I have been blogging now for a few years, I have always felt distant from the larger edublogging community and I think this little exchange sort of points out why (and why some might see me as a hypocrite). This is not a technology blog and I am not into technology for technology's sake. I am into educational law and policy and I use technology to talk about and give advice on those kinds of issues. My job, the one I get paid for, is to teach educational law and ethics and some other ed. leadership issues to future school officials. Sometimes that requires me to put my personal feelings and thoughts aside in favor of the law as it exists in reality.
So, here's the deal. I am going to pull on the reins of technology, as I did in the post for which I was called a hypocrite. It is my job to pull on those reins. If that translates into me recommending against using technology tools that I otherwise think are awesome, so be it. In fact, I take some pride in being called a technology hypocrite. I am an educational lawyer and an educational policy Ph.D. - my identity is hypocritical. It is my job to simultaneously protect the schools and to change the schools - and those two things almost never pull in the same direction at once. I don't have the luxury of being only an educational lawyer or only an educational advocate. Its my job to be both - and, in fact, I would argue that most school leaders, especially technologically savvy school leaders, are in a very similar position.
So, my name is Justin. And, I am proud to be an unapologetic technology hypocrite.