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SALT LAKE CITY -- A principal in New Jersey, frustrated with bullying, says middle and elementary school students should be kept off Facebook completely. But a Utah expert cautions families not to be too hasty.
Anthony Orsini said Thursday on a network morning show that he's fed up with the problems that come with social networking sites -- namely, the bullying, the sexual predators.
"If parents are involved with them ... they get to see what they're doing and create opportunities to teach." Tammer Attallah, Associate Director of Children's Services at Valley Mental Health
The world was introduced to 15-year-old Phoebe Prince in the worst way -- she committed suicide after being relentlessly cyberbullied. Nine of her Massachusetts classmates are charged in the case.
Although Price's story is an extreme example, it's by no means the only one. According to the Pew Research Center, one third of teenagers report being bullied online. Teens ages 14 to 17 are the most targeted.
Associate Director of Children's Services at Valley Mental Health Tammer Attallah said, "A lot of it is occurring as youth become more and more independent."
Attallah doesn't believe this is the time to pull away and impose bans on social networking sites, the reverse viewpoint held by the New Jersey principal. Instead, he suggests parents jump in alongside their kids.
"If parents are involved with them, if they've friended them -- which is something they may want to consider as a policy if they're going to be on Facebook -- that they get to see what they're doing and create opportunities to teach," he said.
Attallah says it's key to keep a running dialogue open with your kids -- many problems he believes exist because parents and kids didn't talk before something happened.
For its part, Facebook has overhauled its Safety Center, adding four times more content on the topic of staying safe online.
There's a special section for teens, but Attallah cautions it's no replacement for a vigilant parent.
"At the end of the day it really becomes the parent in the family's responsibility to make sure there's a monitoring system," he said.
Attallah also suggests as a rule, you keep computers in an open place in your home. That way you can talk with each other about the sites you visit.
E-mail: sdallof@ksl.com
