Oh sure, they'll tell you it's to comply with the law, but most school filters go far beyond the minimal requirements of the Children's Internet Protection Act.
Here are the real reasons schools use filters so much:
1. To preserve limited bandwidth. After all, few schools have upgraded their connections even though most websites use a lot more bandwidth than a few years ago.
2. To avoid liability for the actions of unsupervised students or rogue teachers. Why are we masking those issues with filters instead of dealing with them administratively?
3. To preserve the power of tech coordinators. The keepers of the computers wield an increasing amount of power over instructional decisions, even though it's usually not their area of expertise. Who says which online activities are inappropriate wastes of time and which are useful tools?
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