A Cautionary Tale

 I got a text today from Denise, one of the faculty members. It said, "Will you be my best friend?"

That seemed odd. We already pinky swore we were best friends, like, two years ago, and we talk about boys every time we have a sleepover, so where was this coming from?

Just kidding. The only boys we talk about are our husbands, and only to brag about them. Plus, the last sleepover I ever had with a bestie was probably in 1989. 

When I went to investigate, it turned out that a couple of the girls in Denise's 10th period class had managed to snatch her phone and send out a series of texts to random people in her contacts. The girls are good kids generally, but this is definitely a lesson about password-protecting your phone!

Denise was flustered and less than amused, though she didn't scream at the girls. 

"I have to explain what's going on to about seven different people now," she said. Class was just beginning and she wasn't going to have time to sort this out for another seventy minutes at least.

"Didn't Kim's hair-raising story at lunch not give you the heeby-jeebies about leaving your phone within reach of students?" I asked.

"I know!"she said regretfully. "I thought I had it in my pocket!"

At lunch, Kim regaled us with a tale of what could have been the end of his career and his reputation (and even, perhaps, his freedom) because he left his phone within reach of a student. 

A few years ago, Kim had left his office door unlocked and his phone on his desk while he was teaching a class. A student opened the office door and grabbed the phone. Even though it was password-protected, the student could still access the photo app, and he took the phone with him into the bathroom. There, he proceeded to take a series of very graphic and intimate pictures of himself before putting the phone back on the desk, Kim none the wiser. The student thought it was a hilarious prank.

Several days later, Kim, still unaware of the photos, found that a couple other students had also grabbed his phone and snapped a few selfies of themselves--also as a prank. They told Kim about it, and something told Kim to go and look further back into his photo gallery. That's when he found the graphic photos of the boy. 

Kim was rightfully horrified and even traumatized by the photos. He immediately called our boss to report what he'd found, and that opened a police investigation into child pornography. Kim's phone was confiscated so that investigators could see if a claim could be made that Kim had solicited the photos from the boy, if he had any more such images stored in the phone, and what sorts of searches he had made in his browser. 

Fortunately, the investigation into Kim was closed after the student confessed that he had taken the photos of his own accord. Kim's phone was still destroyed, per policy, but as part of the agreement the boy and his parents made with the court, Kim was paid back the value of the phone. The student was never allowed to take seminary classes again (turns out he also had some issues sexually harassing young women).

My phone is password-protected, but I usually leave it on my desk. When I leave my office, my practice is to lock both my computer screen and my door, but there is a big window through which I speak to students that I cannot lock, even if I slide it shut. I've been lucky so far, but I am also taking this lesson more to heart from now on. The problem is that most dress pants do not include pockets large enough for a phone, which is why I leave the phone behind when I need to use the ladies room or run an errand. Yet my career and reputation could end in just a couple minutes if the wrong kid got hold of my phone...

Food for thought.