Parents Google Your Child

[williamjackson]

Parents Google Your Child

As a presenter at two recent conferences, AME Youth Leadership
Conference  in Palm Coast, Florida and the Hip Hop Men’s Health
Summit in Orlando, Florida my presentations focused on Social
Media content as it relates to Bullying and Cyberbullying.
Speaking with over 300 young men at the Hip Hop Conference
attending my session, there is a disconnect between teens, young
adults and their parents. This motivated me to write this blog
about parents Goggling their children to see what they are doing
online.

Parents your child’s SoLoMo or Social Local Mobile online
presence is influenced by their use of digital media, the platforms
that provide a Social Media Presence. Technology has integrated,
infused and intruded into millions of youth and teen’s lives. 
Students from elementary to high school have direct communication
with each other 24/7 â€" 365, many parents have no clue to the
connective power of Social Media.
Presenting days earlier at the AME Youth Leadership Conference
in Palm Coast, Florida students share how technology benefits
their lives and creates challenges in Bullying, Cyberbullying and
other issues. The influence of Social Local and Mobile technologies
is so powerful it can influence a student’s opportunities for college
acceptance, employment, Internships, military acceptance and even
academic/social performance in school.
The world is very competitive and students are competing for the
best colleges and careers. Social Media has an affect on their positioning.
The establishment of a student’s online reputation is determined by
the content they create and post. Reputations are influenced
tremendously because the first impression society has of youth today
is through Social Media platforms. Examples can be seen through the
Trayvon Martin case and his posted content. So powerful is this that
both sides of this legal battle are focusing on exposing or hiding
Trayvon’s digital content. Social Media content has created a paradigm
shift (Anthony Butler, Sr. E3 Business Group) in a youth’s reputation
and their first impressions to the world.

Parents your children should understand that their Social presence has
far ranging consequences and what they post online never goes away.
A youth and teens Social Media presence and content will never go
away. There’s no longer the initial physical handshakes that create a
first impression in a traditional manner. The handshake is digital,
graphical and multimedia.
The middle and high school students in attendance at the Hip Hop
conference were asked to take out their cell phones to reflect on the
value of thinking and reasoning. The increase in Social Media platforms
has influenced students even at elementary age (8-12) to spread their
content across the world. Parents must understand that their children
are cloning themselves across a digital landscape, their Avatar clones:
textual, graphical and multimedia are on Pinetrest, Facebook, Youtube,
Vine, Vimeo, Instagram, Socialcam, Twitter, Google +, Rebelmouse,
and the list continues to grow.

Businesses and colleges are investigating potential candidates and those
in their networks and friends to see if they are worthy of acceptance and
hiring. The Google Me process is a safeguard or a stopgap to check what
is visible from content postings. This should be done at least twice a month
so parents can view what their children are doing and how they are active
especially during summer break.
Colleges want to make sure their students are not bringing
controversial agendas on campus similar to the recent Boston bombing
suspects. The best way to track or monitor a student’s psychological
and emotional state is to look at their digital content. Looking at postings
that are representative of the challenges and struggles, successes that a
student experiences.

Maybe parents need a Prizm to monitor their children online activity
or in laymen’s terms create digital condoms to protect against posting
potentially damaging content. Parent are concerned about who
“physically” enters their home, but have no clue who or whom has
digital access inside their homes. This digital invasion or inception is
just as dangerous and pervasive.
Parents should view their child’s Social Media pages until their child
is at least responsible for their ability to financially support their access.
Parents must set the foundation for Social Media use. The potential for
Bullying, Sexting, Cyberbullying and Cyberstalking are a possibility as
young men shared from the Hip Hop Summit.
In a digital society using SMH, LMAO, WT* represent the extension
of emotions. Emotional drama is still present and influences discussions.
Social Media trainings and workshops should be available for
youth and teens to prevent drama that can be destructive in nature.
Media elements focus on the negative digital life styles of youth as seen
by the reports of Trayvon Martin. It is remarkable that the media can
access a youth or teens Social Media platforms and manipulate the
perceptions that will either offer sympathy or condemnation against
that teen.

Parents must understand what their children are posting and Google
their children every 2 months to check on content, pictures, video and
activities along with who they are associated with.
During my presentations terms I use: “guilt by association,”
“responsibility and integrity,” and accountability and spirituality.” All
play a part in youth and teens judged by the company they keep
and interact with in online environments.
They are guilty by association because of the postings of friends and
family. If teachers, law enforcement personnel, congressmen, attorneys,
and other professionals can lose their jobs  from inappropriate content a
warning to be sure to see potential conflicts in SoLoMo Social Mobile
Local content.

Teens now have global exposure and must be taught how to gauge their
content. If a youth or teen is not responsible for their Social Media
content there maybe far reaching consequences that transcend into the
adult world. Maybe the Prizm is not a bad idea for parents to use or a
programmer can create a Social Media condom to protect youth and
teens from posting damaging information.
For now it is up to parents that are responsible and accountable to and
for their children.

Summits that I have presented and participated in: the Education Summit
in Jacksonville, Journey Into Woman Hood in Jacksonville, Jacksonville
Urban League Leadership Summit, Save Our Sons Jax in Jacksonville,
AME Youth Leadership Conference  in Palm Coast, Hip Hop Health
Summit in Orlando and the upcoming
Man Up for Health http://ManUpforHealth.eventbrite.com
this Saturday, June 22nd.
These summits, workshops, expos, conferences should be filled to capacity
by parents, educators, politicians and those that represent all our religious
and ministerial denominations. To empower and engage parents, to
strengthen families and build intelligent youth, teens and young adults
that will lead us into the 23rd century. It takes a village to raise out youth
to be leaders.

[Non-RedNeck Westsider]

Sure, William, let's just 'Google' our kids....  SMH (did you get that emotional, anagrammatical reference?)

I guess I'm not into this 'new age' realm of parenting, as I have the passwords to all of my son's social media accounts.  Could he have 2?  Possibly, but I'm more than certain that the ones he uses on his cell are the same that he uses on the computer. 

I guess you could parent from the outside using Google and such, but I prefer doing it from inside my own home.

Thanks anyhow.