Today I read an article about a new program called MouseMail which will provide parents with a new weapon against cyberbullying. MouseMail works by filtering children's emails for inappropriate words and unknown contacts and forwards these messages to a parents' account. The chairman of the board of Safe Communications, Les Ottolenghi, says that the system is "designed to help a parent manage their child's relationship with the Internet and their relationship, in turn, to their child."
While I'm sure many kids would be disappointed by their parents' involvement in their personal life, I'm thrilled to read that programs and others like it exist. I understand that policing an adolescent's emails and texts is an impossible mission for parents, which is where MouseMail would come in handy in helping protect children from dangers that are so foreign to us adults. Bullying has tamped up to stratosphere-ic levels in recent years making the need for systems like this all the more imperative. G-d knows, parenting is hard enough and we could use all of the support we can get!
~Jackie Villet
School Counselor
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