NEWS FROM O’FALLON CITY HALL
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NETSMARTZ - INTERNET SAFETY WORKSHOP FOR PARENTS
O’Fallon, Illinois – March 12, 2008-- Mayor Gary L. Graham is pleased to announce that the O’Fallon Police Department and O’Fallon School District 90 will team up to present “NetSmartz,” an internet safety workshop for parents of children and teens. The 45-minute workshop presentation will be held on two dates—Wednesday, March 27 and Thursday, April 3 at 6:30 p.m. at Delores M. Moye Elementary School.
O’Fallon DARE Officer John Stover will lead an interactive presentation provided by NetSmartz, showing real-life experiences between children and teens and on-line predators. The presentation will be divided short segments including “Characteristics of an Online Victim,” “Risks Online,” “Characteristics of an Online Predator,” “Online Safety Tips,” and “What You Can Do.” The program is geared towards parents of children and teens ages 5 to 17.
“Any parent or caregiver who has a computer in their home or office and have children and teens with access to that computer, needs to attend our NetSmartz safety program,” stated DARE Office Stover, who has completed two years of certification on Internet safety programs. “The hour you spend at this seminar will open your eyes to Internet safety and give you invaluable tools to keep your family safe in today’s techno-savvy world.”
The idea for the workshop came from a dedicated group of parents at Moye who saw an increasing need to start Internet education for parents and children in elementary schools.
“Many parents were sharing experiences of how their own child had viewed or stumbled upon inappropriate material on the Internet—including pornographic material, inappropriate content, violent games, and misuse of chat rooms—beginning as early as the first grade,” said Jane Stone, committee member and parent of a 4th grader at Moye Elementary school. “Most parents, including myself, didn’t anticipate these situations would occur prior to Junior High and didn’t know how to protect against them,” said Stone. “Our PTO Board discussed the idea of an informative meeting for parents at our school. District 90 and the O’Fallon Police Department jumped on the idea and took it to the next level.”
“This is a great workshop that O’Fallon District 90 plans to roll out to other schools in the District. The program will help parents know what steps will ensure children are ‘cyber-safe’ when using a computer or visiting an on-line profile site (e.g., Facebook or MySpace) from now through their high school years,” said Rob Stoelzle, Crisis Prevention Intervention Counselor at O’Fallon District 90. “Our next steps will be to help develop school assemblies appropriate to age groups that will follow the NetSmartz program on Internet safety.”
The workshop is open to any parent or caregiver in O’Fallon. Refreshments and a question-and-answer period will follow with Office Stover. Childcare and activities for the evening will be provided by “Players with a Passion,” a group of O’Fallon Township High School athletes.
Committee members from the Moye PTO include President Kathy Smitherman, Vice-President Kelly Cooper, and Jane Stone.
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Additional Information Contact:
Pamala L. Funk
Asst. City Administrator
624-4500, extension 9-1112
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