Fingerprint clearance for school Volunteers

Your Childs safety both while at school and in the community is a primary concern of George McCann Memorial Catholic School.

Roman Catholic Diocese of Fresno California policy specifies that schools fingerprint and clear certain volunteers with the following assigned responsibilities.

• All school volunteers who have unsupervised access to children. This includes unsupervised volunteers at school, at school sponsored events and on field trips (e.g. field trip drivers and chaperones).
• All classroom volunteers whether they are supervised or not.
• All volunteer coaches and assistant coaches whether they are supervised or not.
• All overnight activity chaperones.

  For the diocesan volunteer policy, “unsupervised” is defined to mean that a volunteer is not directly supervised by a school employee at all times when the volunteer has contact with students.

Family Internet Usage Safety Recommendations

Parents, we're living in a brave, new world. The Internet impacts a child's world-view, and our ability to parent, more than any invention in modern times. The Internet is a fascinating place, full of rich and interesting information. But as a gigantic virtual community, it has "good neighborhoods", "questionable neighborhoods", and "downright bad neighborhoods". Unfortunately advances in computer and telecommunication technology that allow our children to reach out to new sources of knowledge and cultural experiences are also leaving them vulnerable to exploitation and harm.

Every family with children should have some form of Internet filtering and controls to protect their kids (See Free K9 Web Protection below). In addition, the following list of recommendations will help protect our children while allowing a safe internet/computer usage environment.

1. Keep the computer in a common room in the house, not in your child's bedroom. It is much more difficult for a criminal to communicate with a child when the computer screen is visible to a parent or another member of the household.
2. Use of chat rooms is not recommended. There is much more to the on-line experience than chat rooms.
3. Spend time with your children on-line. Have them teach you about their favorite on-line destinations.
4. Utilize parental controls provided by your service provider and/or blocking software (See Free K9 Web Protection below).
5. Always maintain access to your child's on-line account and randomly check his/her e-mail. Be aware that your child could be contacted through the U.S. Mail. Be up front with your child about your access and reasons why.
6. Teach your child the responsible use of the resources on-line.

• For addition information and helpful suggestions please visit the FBI’s official internet security website:
  http://www.fbi.gov/publications/pguide/pguidee.htm

 Free K9 Web Protection Software
K9 Web Protection is easy-to-use Parental Control and Internet filtering software that helps parents protect their children online. K9 Web Protection has the ability to block adult and other offensive content, prevent spyware infections, and monitor visited sites on any Internet access connection. Based on commercial-grade Web filtering controls from Blue Coat Systems, K9 Web Protection is unique among content filters and it is free for home use. K9 can be configured as an inappropriate site blocker, a spyware stopper, a gambling filter or various other configurations based on our over 55 Web categories.

The Blue Coat Systems, K9 Web Protection website is:
http://www.k9webprotection.com

The free K9 Web Protection Software can be downloaded at:
http://www.download.com/K9-Web-Protection/3000-2162_4-10487710.html