A university with which I will not name and am only slightly affiliated wants to stop students from browsing facebook and the like while they are in class. President of said school is demanding a technological solution to the problem.

I have told my friend in IT there that there is no way to effectively (and ethically) stop students from browsing the web in this way. Before he is willing to believe me, he feels as if he must think of every possible option.

If you have an idea how to accomplish this, please post it here. If we find our way to one that works, we'll immediately begin switch the thread to the topic of circumventing the security... but that's for the future.

7/28/2010 3:42:13 PM

Just block those sites on your campus network. The same way companies do for their employees.

7/28/2010 3:47:54 PM

So I pull out my mobile phone and use it, instead... Problem not averted

[Edited on July 28, 2010 at 3:51 PM. Reason : PS - how do you get them all?]

7/28/2010 3:51:05 PM

Ban laptops, kick out students that use mobile phones, support instructors that do so.

Common fucking sense. If you can't take notes with a pencil you don't deserve an education.

7/28/2010 3:54:17 PM

It is impossible, and a university should not waste their resources on prevention of alternate activities during class. Students are paying for the education regardless of the student's attention level. Conversely, the university is not paying the student to be attentive. This is why attendance policies always seemed so absurd to me.

Instead, universities should spend resources figuring out how to get the professors to be properly effective and interesting teachers that engage and inspire students.



[Edited on July 28, 2010 at 3:59 PM. Reason : grammar]

7/28/2010 3:56:09 PM

lol. Fair solution. I agree completely. However, this college has several majors which require the use of a computer, and the president wants a technical solution to the problem.

Before I coerce my friend to tell him it's not doable, I want to make sure I cover all the bases.

[Edited on July 28, 2010 at 3:57 PM. Reason : ^amen]

7/28/2010 3:57:01 PM

Technically this is quite doable.

For the wireless network, as others suggested, it's a matter of either blocking specific sites, or if there are only a handful of sites that are needed for coursework, blacklisting everything but those needed sites.

For cell phones, you can also install devices that block cell phone reception if they want to take it to that level.. or simply just ban mobile phone use in class.


As others have stated, it's a terrible idea to implement.

7/28/2010 4:00:23 PM

i agree with what gs7 said.

7/28/2010 4:00:34 PM

Requires use of computers?

You can get a Computer Science degree and never have a legitimate reason to use a computer during lecture.

7/28/2010 4:01:07 PM

But you have more trouble being taught how to model 3d game sprites and integrate that with motion capture suits and add effects.

7/28/2010 4:05:50 PM

I like this article from the Washington Post ... the whole thing is dedicated to how and why some university professors are outright banning laptops from their classrom ... then there are the last few paragraphs, that I totally agree with:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/08/AR2010030804915_2.html?sid=ST2010030805078

Quote :

"Plenty of professors still allow laptops. Siva Vaidhyanathan, an associate professor of media studies and law at U-Va., generally permits them in his classes. He remembers his own college diversion: reading newspapers surreptitiously on the floor beneath his desk. He believes that, ultimately, it is a professor's job to hold the class's attention. "If students don't want to pay attention, the laptop is the least of your problems," he said. Vaidhyanathan, an Internet scholar, senses a losing battle. In an era of iPhones and BlackBerrys, Internet-ready cellphones have become just as prevalent in classrooms as laptops, and equally capable of distraction. If professors had hoped to hermetically seal their teaching space by banning laptops, they might be about three years too late. "The question 'Laptop or not?' isn't as big a question as the question of a screen or not," he said. "And, sitting in front of 200 students, I can't really enforce a ban on anything." "

7/28/2010 4:15:43 PM

Right, but we're focusing on technological approaches to the problem

7/28/2010 4:17:30 PM

did you read my post?

7/28/2010 4:18:38 PM

Bobby solved it for you.

This is entirely possible, easily.

7/28/2010 4:25:10 PM

Well, if the school is going to be stupid about it, they might as well be draconian too.

1) Block all outbound traffic from any IP address that isn't registered as an instructor device on the LAN.
2) Ban the use of cell phones on campus
3) Lose money when all the students that decide going to a tech school where they can't use technology sucks go somewhere else
4) Waste a ton of money trying to come up with the right balance between being a draconian ass and letting people who don't want to learn fail.
5a) Admit it was all a mistake and give up
OR
5b) Whine to the media and the government about how you can't afford to stay open and are too big to fail ... profit!

7/28/2010 4:25:42 PM

^ yep

make the classroom networks separate from the regular univeristy netowrk, then block access to sites like many companies do.

As far as cellphones, jammers from what i know are Illegal to use even a unversity. And you dont want to deal with the legal reprocussions if somebody has a heart attack and no body can call 911.

Make a no cellphone policy and make teachers enforce it.

Frankly I think this is one of those problems where people think IT is the problem and the solution, but they are really trying to make the tail wag the dog.

It can do all this, but the real problem is the teachers, and you cant make IT force the teachers to disallow cellphones.

7/28/2010 4:27:53 PM

I wish a fuckin' professor would've tried to tell me I couldn't have had my cell phone on me during class.

7/28/2010 4:29:18 PM

go find dr. boles and tell him how you feel about it

7/28/2010 4:33:44 PM

You can't blacklist sites that you don't want people in, because your blacklist will always be incomplete.

You can't completely cut them off from the internet, because apparently they need it sometimes (I had to ask about just white listing a couple of sites, which was feasible but not useful here). And then their network is built so that if you did this you couldn't do it classroom by classroom, you'd have to do it building by building, so the general purpose labs would get cut off and those shouldn't be.

[Edited on July 28, 2010 at 4:42 PM. Reason : ^It's not a state school]

7/28/2010 4:41:51 PM

if i'm paying for the education, then i should be allowed to do what i want in the classroom as long as it's not a huge distraction. how much of a distraction facebook is can be debated but i really don't think it's the school's place to tell people where they can and cannot visit online. if it was high school, sure i'm all for it.

7/28/2010 4:49:46 PM

EMP

7/28/2010 4:56:05 PM

Quote :

"You can't completely cut them off from the internet, because apparently they need it sometimes"

As soon as you allow unsupervised outside access, all bets are off for any determined student, so the school might as well give up now.

7/28/2010 4:59:15 PM

Let me get this straight:
- Stop students from surfing facebook on laptops or phones
- Must be a technical solution
- Can't block websites because of computer labs

...Robocop? Build a couple Robocops that will stand behind the students and shoot them when they pull out their cell phones?

I seriously don't think there's a solution here that fits. Install security cameras in the back of every classroom and when someone in the monitoring room spots a student on Facebook he sends the Thought Police to get them.

7/28/2010 5:08:12 PM

Blocking or banning cellphones on campus is a great idea until a Korean guy drops by and shoots up your class.

7/28/2010 5:09:08 PM

too soon?

7/28/2010 5:09:43 PM

Blocking or banning cellphones on campus is a great idea until a guy of indeterminate race drops by and shoots up your class.

It's a safety concern is all I'm sayin'.

7/28/2010 5:10:31 PM

Fair point.

7/28/2010 5:29:04 PM

^^911 will just give you a busy signal anyway.

7/28/2010 5:41:02 PM

Quote :

"EMP"

i LOLed

7/28/2010 5:44:31 PM

I actually did this for free using pfSense + squidGuard in transparent mode.

But if I was actually a student in that class, I'd be the one charging kids $5.00/lecture to have my 4g hotspot PSK.

7/28/2010 5:51:17 PM

Quote :

"EMP"

srsly

7/28/2010 6:29:45 PM

if you wired the entire building with femtocells you could effectively block all data communication, preserve emergency use scenarios, and firewall the internal networks.

It's expensive, questionable solution (in terms of working and safety.) But I'd like to see it


The real thing to do would be simply have more engaging professors. Or hook up a proxy and have him call out a few people on facebook. Or be like boles and come down hard on the entire class if he sees a cell phone (or heaven forbid hear it ring/vibrate.)

7/28/2010 7:34:04 PM

First This is impossible.

Second if I absolutely had to do it, all you can do as its been said is ban cellphones, which isnt going to work as then you just hide it under the desk and most professors aren't going to enforce it. And firewall the networks properly as Bobby said. Then the resident techies are just gonna proxy out and around this. Or break out the hotspots.

That said, also if you ban computers, you are running risk of a lawsuit with ADA as some students have a required learning need of a computer.

Also if this is a public university, you are begging for a 1st amendment lawsuit blocking anything unless its under security reasons, and even then most universities have to have an opt out policy.

Thirdly, you cant block cellphone signals. Its illegal. On most state and federal levels. Prisons are having a field day right now with this as inmates are getting phones and they want to block them and cant. Only can ban them. Also with banning them, woe to the professor when his/hers goes off in class (which more often gets more laughs/attention than when a student's goes off).

7/28/2010 10:11:58 PM

1) its not impossible
2) it's worse, it's something you should not even think about implementing, you'll think you're doing good and something will happen that will bite you in the ass that you never even considered

people expect universities (of all places) to be a place that symbolizes expression, not prohibition (unless the school in question is a strict religious private university with it's own rules/regulations)

when you say "facebook and the like" where are you drawing a line? is cnn.com too much of a distraction? only social media? what about linkedin? that's professional based but you could still waste a bit of time on it.

quit while you're not behind too much

7/28/2010 10:43:21 PM

let us all remember that the OP said no to their friend and is only asking here to exhaust possibilities...

that said, I agree it's a ridiculous proposition.

I also find fault with the argument that "it's not the students' fault if the professor isn't captivating their audience (or whatnot)."

I have seen a number of university students who are simply warming up a chair because their parents paid for them to have that right, and while I am not advertising myself as a charismatic, fabulous instructor, I know that all the other kids were paying attention. Even if it is a well liked professor, there's likely to be some student in that class who doesn't jive with that teaching style.

/rant

[Edited on July 29, 2010 at 12:34 AM. Reason : bargh]

and I totally agree:

Quote :

"He remembers his own college diversion: reading newspapers surreptitiously on the floor beneath his desk."

[Edited on July 29, 2010 at 12:37 AM. Reason : people will fight for their right to X (insert whatever you wish for X)]

7/29/2010 12:33:50 AM

Man I remember getting my first smartphone in college, that changed my life! My grades did improve too, when I didn't have to sit through class bored...

I agree, attendance and attention requirements are not sensical. "Teach" in class, assign work, test, whatever, but why do you care if somebody is able to multitask or even not attend your class if they can still attain a certain level of aptitude on the subject matter.

The more appropriate approach (in my opinion that is) should be handling the material such that one would want to pay attention, and perhaps participate. Make the class time more valuable to the students.

That said, if I were a professor, and half my students were on laptops... I'd be pretty upset.

7/29/2010 3:00:12 AM

Quote :

"if I were a professor"

i loled

7/29/2010 4:09:38 AM

Use NBAR to filter out url requests ... it will stop 90% of those student trying from being able to get to those sites. The few hackers can always find a solution, but this would still significantly reduce the amount of facebooking ... Its a wasted effort to try to stop 100% ... as someone said ... enough people with mobile devices now ... the effort would be wasted.

This solution requires no additional hardware (its configured on your cisco routers at the edge of the network).

[Edited on July 29, 2010 at 8:21 AM. Reason : .]

7/29/2010 8:14:49 AM

^.

7/29/2010 9:50:48 AM

The students, or their parents, are paying for them to be there. If they aren't disturbing other students then leave them the fuck alone. Its not the professors job to make them pay attention; its their job to teach the material to the students who want to learn it.

7/29/2010 9:53:52 AM

Quote :

"Common fucking sense. If you can't take notes with a pencil you don't deserve an education."

7/29/2010 10:03:14 AM

^ i wanted to comment on that earlier but its a sidenote to the topic which is websites

my first 3 years of college were average or below, mainly because noone had ever taught me how to take good notes or organize the material and my handwriting is that of a 5 year old so going over even my old notes was a chore

some drug addict needed a quick fix in my dorm and sold me a powerbook for $200 on the spot (lol, i sold it back for more) and i made dean's list my last year because you can type faster than you can write (maybe if i had learned shorthand?) and therefore you can capture more of the lecture without worrying about space. plus you have the ability to bold, italicize, colorize,etc....on the spot

they say you learn something just by writing it down and i think the same goes for typing something up and organizing it yourself which you can do faster on a computer

7/29/2010 10:20:29 AM

http://www.lanschool.com/

Thoughts? Someone apparently offered this as a solution to the problem

it's the software that has been suggested be installed on individual's computers as well as all lab computers. It allows dynamic white lists on a per class basis. It also allows a "All Eyes to the Front" screen to take over the PC at any time, and it allows a professor to put the image on his PC on all students' screens.



EDIT: This software also shows the student's desktop to the professor. So the professor can have access to the students screen at any time. They would require this software to go on any laptops being used for the class. This makes me , but please share your thoughts

[Edited on July 29, 2010 at 10:41 AM. Reason : Added the part where its a massive invasion of students privacy]

7/29/2010 10:38:54 AM

Quote :

"Common fucking sense. If you can't take notes with a pencil you don't deserve an education."

Still trying to figure out whether this and the quoting of this was sarcasm. I'm not sure a post detailing the merit of an electronic bookkeeping system over pencil and paper is necessary in a forum named "Tech Talk".

Students pay for the fucking education. Stop punishing them for 1)not paying attention or 2)not attending classes. Just lay out a syllabus at the beginning, test them, and give them the grades they deserve for the effort they put in.

7/29/2010 10:40:36 AM

^^You said it, that is:

Quote :

"a massive invasion of students privacy"

7/29/2010 10:55:37 AM

^^^ Yeah. That software would be coming straight off my laptop. And if you make it a requirement for me to have it to use your Internet, I will slap a lawsuit in the school's face for invading my privacy and do whatever it takes to give you guys as much negative attention as possible.

7/29/2010 11:57:08 AM

I hope this is high school we are talking about.

Because if you are paying to go to college, you should be able to feel free to ignore your education whilst browsing the internet in class.

7/29/2010 12:13:16 PM

Also, said school should find a new forward thinking president.

That is the most optimal solution.

7/29/2010 12:20:07 PM

require students to install a program that blocks those sites during classtime ... only the professor has the password that will allow the program to be uninstalled

if they try to load the sites, it turns the volume up and screams out "IM LOOKIN AT GAY POOORNN!!"

7/29/2010 12:32:00 PM

The software I posted the link to allows something similar. It lets the professor dynamically white list certain sites and then restrict those again, as well as stopping them from using their computer all together with the "all eyes to the front" screen. I am ok with all of this functionality.

It's that the professor gets access to the users screen that I disagree with. this would be a fine solution otherwise

7/29/2010 1:23:34 PM