The technological resources of Panamerican School, such as computers, the internal network, internet access, and audiovisual equipment, among others, are offered to provide our students whatever they need in order to promote educational excellence supported on technology. 

Panamerican School believes in the educational value of the Internet and recognizes its potential for supporting our curriculum. Nevertheless, the school also recognizes the potential damage of wrong use or abuse that can be given due to Internet access, and will put forth all effort to protect our students and teachers. The school maintains the appropriate software and hardware that is designed to limit the access to harmful or detrimental materials on the Internet. Such filtration, nevertheless, will not be able to completely protect the users from having access to the detrimental materials on the Internet. All the users will have to remain alert and continuously take care to avoid unsuitable or illegal interaction with members of the worldwide virtual community. 

The computers of classrooms, library, laboratories and internal network of Panamerican School are available only for educational purposes. 

Students will be responsible for the ethical use of computers, network access accounts of the school and other technological tools that will be offered for academic development. 

The purpose of the following policies is guiding students in the correct use of these resources. The school may control, monitor and, depending on the case, cancel the student access if it considers necessary to protect the safety, availability and integrity of school information and systems. 

The policies in this document are in accordance with the school's educational philosophy and National Rules of Networks Security. 

Students should be respectful in their use of computers at school and follow the instructions given by Department of technology and teachers. This includes submitting to the following: 

·         No food, candy or drinks in the computer areas.

·         Inform Technology Area staff of any problems you may have with the equipment and do not make any changes in the equipment settings.

·         The use of equipment is restricted to academic activities in classroom hours and under teacher supervision.

·         The use of computers outside classroom hours will be only for academic purposes related to school and requires proper authorization and supervision of a teacher. In this case, any damage caused to equipment will be direct student responsibility.

·         Immediately report to the Technology Area staff any lost, stolen or damaged equipment.

·         The school’s computer labs are workplaces; remember to keep the noise level down and avoid using such spaces for socializing with classmates.

·         Use only software programs authorized by the school and keep all your files in authorized places only. Transfer them to a storage device (USB, CD, floppy disk, etc.), since the school will not become responsible for information that could be lost or damaged. Remember that all information stored in the Panamerican School networkand computers is, in reality, the School property, and at any time the Technology area staff can review the files stored in folders. Unsuitable and/or unlicensed software will be erased or uninstalled without forewarning.

·         Print service can only be made with explicit authorization of a teacher and only for academic purposes.

·         Use the Internet as an educational resource and accept responsibility for Internet sites visited and all material received under your account.

·         Avoid giving out personal information such as passwords, your name, address, phone number, and credit card numbers.

·         Report infractions, suspicious behavior, or privacy violations to the Teacher or to Technology staff.

·         Log off after you have finished your session and leave the work area tidy.

·         Do not open any document that has been identified as infected by a virus.

·         If a computer is damaged from misuse, the user is responsible for its repair or replacement.

·         Incite drugs use, hatred or violence, pornography, obscene material or promote dangerous or antisocial behavior.

·         Would tarnish the reputation of Panamerican School. Remember that you are a representative of our school using a non-private system. You can be alone with your computer, but whatever you say and do can be seen globally. Never use vulgarities, swear words, or improper language.

Students are advised that there will be consequences if they participate in inadequate activities described below: 

Category 2 - inadequate activities considered as serious misconduct that will be described in a report of breach of security policy.  

Students who participate in any one of the following inadequate activities will be disciplined. This can lead to a conversation with parents, loss privilege of using computers, suspension of classes, expulsion from school and the appropriate legal implications, if necessary. Activities that are included in this category are considered serious and interfere in the normal operation of our system or may be harmful to members of our community. Even those who are guilty for the first time may face serious consequences. 

Hacking- Students are not to attempt to access or modify network resources for which they do not have permission, for any reason whatsoever. The Student who engages in suspicious activities such as tampering with the school’s security software, ‘snooping’, falsifying their identity, or hiding files, will be viewed as a security threat.

Files- Students are not to store or send inappropriate files in any of school’s computers.

Privacy- Students are not to use, to attempt to access, or to interfere with another person´s private resources, such as their login, password, email or files. (Example: installation of keyloger software or any application that may capture personal details).

Internet- Students are not to access inappropriate websites or to create websites that threaten the integrity of the Panamerican community promoting antisocial attitudes or for commercial purpose.

Dishonesty-students are not to copy and paste text, images, or graphics from websites that are protected by copyright without ‘proper acknowledgment’ or permission of the owner of the intellectual property. If you wish to use some information from the Internet, you should cite the source information. The Institutional policy on this subject is 0% of plagiarism in the signed work, with this purpose we will use services to verify the legitimacy of the work delivered by students.

Security-students are not to reveal or send information from others that might jeopardize its security.

Vandalism-students are not to participate in vandalism. Vandalism is defined as any malicious or criminal damage, steal or destroy the school technological resources, furniture or other users belongs.

Cyberbullying - Cyberbullying is the use of any electronic communication device to convey a message in any form (text, image, audio, or video) that defames, intimidates, harasses, or is otherwise intended to harm, insult, or humiliate another in a deliberate, repeated, or hostile and unwanted manner under a person’s true or false identity. The school will take any report of cyberbullying seriously and will investigate credible reports promptly.  Students are encouraged to report an incident immediately to a teacher or principal.  Students who make a report are requested to preserve evidence of cyberbullying.  For example, a student may save or bring a copy of an email, text message, picture or other electronic transmission that the student believes was intended to harm, insult, or humiliate. 

Category 1 - inadequate activities considered as “light” misconduct that will be recorded in a violation folder. 

Students who participate in the following activities cause inconvenient problems and interfere in the use of computers by others. Often these actions may cause additional time spent by the technology staff to restore school’s network resources or may destroy them. 

These students will be mentioned by coordinators and the report provided by the Technology department will be attached to the student’s folder. The recurrence of any such activities will be considered as category 2, serious misconduct.  

·         Students are not allowed to install any programs on school computers. If necessary to do so students must request from the Department of technology with at least two days in advance, provided that the school will have the resources and licenses.

·         Students cannot install unauthorized games (offline & online) or play with them.

·         Students are not allowed to download, install, or use programs to access music, videos or to transfer P2P files (for instance, Ares, LimeWire, Kazaa, Messenger or similar etc.).

·         Students cannot change computer configurations such as the cursor, color, screen saver, background, etc.

·         Students cannot disconnect or change in any way physical equipment connections. The wiring and electrical connections must be handled exclusively by the designated technology staff.

·         Students should not use computers to listen to music or watch videos without authorization.

·         Students cannot access “chat” services under any circumstances and the use of these services will be monitored.

·         Students should not interfere in the work of other people in the computer rooms, for this reason, should remain silent or if group work is necessary a moderate tone of voice is required.

·         Students cannot access their personal e-mail accounts except with a teacher instruction, and then only for academic activities.