A frustrated Ottawa Student Transportation Authority dropped the hammer Thursday on abusive students from across Ottawa who took to Twitter early Thursday morning to vent their frustration about the schoolbus provider’s decision to allow buses to run a regular schedule the day after the city’s first snowstorm this year..
The schoolbus company, which operates for the public and Catholic boards, began banning students from viewing or posting to its Twitter account after the remarks became increasingly outrageous and crude through the day.
“This is definitely the worse (day) we’ve had,” said Vicky Kyriaco, general manager of the transportation authority. “We shake our heads and just say ‘wow’. We know they are upset, but really I don’t believe there’s a foundation for the level of outrage that has been expressed.”
Tweets ranged from silly and humorous to downright crude.
“you guys should have made it a snow day idiots please change your minds i don’t want to go to school because it stinks,” wrote Stephen Hickson at 8:04 a.m.
” it’s your fault becuase you didn’t give us a snow day, you should expect bad language at the LEAST !,” said Bren Hunter at 10:10 a.m.
“When my dog found out it wasn’t a snow day, he killed my dad then my brother and sent me to school to tell all my friends,” wrote Jason Amm at around 10:50 a.m.
“My dad made me walk 10K to school and I saw 3 dead children in the snow bank!” wrote Callum Nolan, at around 12:50 p.m.
“QUICK SOMEBODY BURN DOWN A SCHOOL BUS SO THEY KNOW WE’RE MAD” wrote Ryan Kent, at around 8 a.m. before following it up with an expletive-laced tweet at around noon.
The Twitter frenzy from students, much of which occurred while students were supposed to be attending classes, pushed the Ottawa Student Transportation Authority’s Twitter account (@OttSchoolBus) was trending in Ottawa on Thursday, meaning it was one of the most talked about topics in the city.
The Twitter account is used to update parents and students about the status of buses.
Kyriaco said the bus authority has seen backlash from students, who hope that snowstorms will shut schools and allow them to stay home, almost every time the decision is made to go ahead with school transportation plans. However, she said it seems to be getting worse. Which is why the organization has started blocking students who send comments that appear to go too far.
“It’s entirely up to society and their parents to determine whether it’s appropriate or not. What we do is we believe in freedom of expression. We just don’t think we should propagate those kinds of comments and we block them from our account,” she said. “If there’s inappropriate comments made then the user will be blocked. Which is unfortunate because then they miss out on a very important channel of information and communication about what’s going on with our bussing.”
Anger over the decision to move ahead with service on Thursday raged well into the afternoon. Many of those complaining to the authority cited safety concerns as a reason why busses should be cancelled. Some even posted pictures of bus crashes to the Twitter feed.
There were no Ottawa school buses involved in any accidents on Thursday morning.
She also said the school bus authority regularly reviews weather information from multiple sources and makes a decision about whether to allow buses to pickup students four hours before pickups are scheduled to start to make sure they have the most up to date information available. She said some school boards in Eastern Ontario were harder hit by snow on Wednesday night and they decided to cancel buses. However, Ottawa didn’t see those conditions. Which meant buses were rolling this morning.
Matthew Johnson, director of education at Media Smarts, a nation wide organization that is dedicated to promoting digital and media literacy, said the outrage expressed online is a sign of the times. Johnson said, in many cases, teenagers don’t realize that what their posting online is publicly available for anyone to see. They just think they’re joining in on a funny gag being perpetrated by their friends.
“Tweeting publicly to the School bus account is likely not something they are thinking will be seen by people outside of their circle,” he said. “Obviously it is fully public and is something that their parents, teachers or administrators at the school could easily be made aware of.”
Johnson also said, when a person is in their bedroom or family room and is typing on a keyboard, that they will say and do things that they wouldn’t do if they were in front of a crowded room of actual people.
“When you’re responding to an account on Twitter that doesn’t have a person’s identity associated with it, it seems impersonal to the kids who are tweeting to it,” he said.
Johnson said the challenge for parents today is to teach their kids that just because their on Twitter, Facebook or an online chatroom that the basic courtesy’s and moral values associated with interacting with people, need to be observed.
He said, he’s heard from far too many parents who lament the march of technology and say they just can’t keep up with their child’s online activities. However, Johnson said, parents must focus on teaching their children that the way they act online isn’t like a video game that can simply be reset. Comments, pictures and jokes shared online could stay online forever and be seen by people that the poster had no intention of sharing that information with.
