When I was a kid, I used to be really into the Grandma's Attic books, which were sort of a wittier version of the Little House books. The stories were explicitly Christian and taught good morals, but sometimes I thought that they, or at least some of the people in them, went a little overboard. For instance, when the heroine became a teacher, she had to promise "to abstain from dancing," "not to go out with any young man except insofar as it may be necessary to stimulate Sunday school work," "not to fall in love,"  and "to remain in [her] home  when not actively engaged in school or church work elsewhere."

I always thought that was a bit much even for the 1890s. But when I read something like this (adult themes) --

The crudeness of some Facebook or MySpace teacher profiles, which are far, far away from sanitized Web sites ending in ".edu," prompts questions emblematic of our times: Do the risque pages matter if teacher performance is not hindered and if students, parents and school officials don't see them?

. . . I'm forced to concede that maybe those puritans in the 1890s were on to something.

Comments

[Joe Dalfonzo]

This very day there are two stories on Fox News - one about a "teacher" in Tampa that went directly from jail to continue her trysts with a minor, the second regarding the wife of a principal, charged with sexual crimes involving Special Education students. I'm confident that most teachers are moral, upright professionals but school boards and PARENTS need to get involved and "police the waterfront". Any so called teacher that can be connected with material such as that presented in the news article should be suspended immediately. And if the ensuing investigation proves guilt, they should be immediately barred from teaching. You would not invite these people into your home to present this material to your kids ... why would you pay them to do it at school?

[LeeQuod]

(Playing advocatus diaboli a bit.) But Joe, don't we first have to establish that personal behavior affects professional performance? During the attempt to impeach Bill Clinton there were many who argued that the two were quite separate. (In writing that, it strikes me that Christians are among the few who advocate for true integrity - where all of a person's behavior needs to be *integrated* into a consistent whole.)

[Steve (SBK)]

LQ, Those are similar to the thoughts I had when I read: "At the same time, my work and social lives are completely separate." Yep. No unifying mind provides an overlap, right?

[Paul]

Do the risque pages matter if teacher performance is not hindered and if students, parents and school officials don't see them?

"If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?"