Teachers Just Want to Have Fun

I heard on the news this morning that Millersville University is involved in a lawsuit over denying a teacher her certification over a MySpace photo of her with a drink at a Halloween party.

Rightfully, she's suing the school over the whole thing. I hope she gets this corrected. In an age when anyone can post anything about anyone, it doesn't make sense to evaluate if she posted the pictures herself or it was someone else. There's nothing wrong with having an unprofessional life, and we need to learn to consider context. A drunken pirate at a Halloween party does not imply she represents a drunken pirate in the classroom.

Would this have been different if it was posted to FaceBook, which had traditionally started out as more of a college-age service? Of course, MySpace started out as a place for bands, so what's it matter what the intended audience is?

Here's a more local link to the story.