Read the latest news and brand new pieces on youth, social media, and emerging technologies! We focus on preventing harm and promoting positive online behaviors.

When Can Educators Search Student Cell Phones?
Do students have an expectation of privacy on their cell phones while at school? The short answer to this is a qualified yes. Whether educators have the authority to search the contents of student cell phones depends on a lot of factors. The key issue in this analysis (that we have raised before on this […]

Teachers, Administrators, and the Search of Student Cell Phones
As we know, students use their smart phones and cell phones to engage in cyberbullying or other forms of teen technology misuse at school, regardless of the presence of formal policies that prohibit their display or use during some or all hours of the school day. Ask any professional at a middle or high school, […]

Guidelines for Online Communication between Teachers and Students
The state of Virginia has recently proposed guidelines for public schools in order to prevent sexual (and other forms of) misconduct between educators and students. Justin and I have blogged about this issue here and here in the past – and it continues to be a topic of strong interest and controversy as we work […]

Obtaining Cyberbullying Evidence from Third Parties at School
Here is a recent question submitted that we thought could help others in a similar situation: “In my role as a school administrator, many of the accusations regarding cyberbullying come from third parties. I am unable to produce evidence on the accused offending party because I do not have access to their media device (i.e. […]

A Call for Consistency in Information Reported in Cyberbullying Research Articles
Here at the Cyberbullying Research Center, in addition to our own projects, Sameer and I work hard to stay on top of all of the cyberbullying research being done by others. When new reports are released, or when articles are published in journals, we are probably among the first to read them. While there has […]

Happy New Year and CRC Initiatives for 2011
Happy New Year everyone! We hope that you all enjoyed whatever holiday you celebrated and that your 2011 is productive and rewarding. Sameer and I have a number of exciting projects and initiatives planned for 2011 and I just wanted to preview some of those here so that you can follow our progress over the […]

Happy New Year and CRC Initiatives for 2011
Happy New Year everyone! We hope that you all enjoyed whatever holiday you celebrated and that your 2011 is productive and rewarding. Sameer and I have a number of exciting projects and initiatives planned for 2011 and I just wanted to preview some of those here so that you can follow our progress over the […]

Bullying and Cyberbullying Laws – Clarifications on our Fact Sheet
Our state-by-state bullying and cyberbullying laws fact sheet is one of the top-most documents downloaded from our site; we encourage you to check it out if you haven’t already. That said, it is also a fluid resource that we are constantly updating. Some recent questions have been posed, and so I wanted to take the […]

Bullying and Cyberbullying Laws – Clarifications on our Fact Sheet
Our state-by-state bullying and cyberbullying laws fact sheet is one of the top-most documents downloaded from our site; we encourage you to check it out if you haven’t already. That said, it is also a fluid resource that we are constantly updating. Some recent questions have been posed, and so I wanted to take the […]

Bullying and Cyberbullying Pledges in the School and Community
I’ve been seeing a lot of “cyberbullying pledges” surfacing in recent months. Obviously, the intention is good – to enlist and rally the support of youth who belong to a school or another organization to end (or at least reduce) the problem of peer harassment. I think that it is important for us to think […]