More than three years after social-networking web sites such as MySpace and Facebook first began cropping up online, school leaders still struggle with how to set policies regarding the use of such sites both inside and outside of school--and many school systems lack these policies altogether, according to a recent survey.

Educators, administrators, and school board members who registered for the National School Boards Association's annual Technology + Learning (T+L) Conference were sent an email survey prior to the November event. Only 35 percent of the respondents said their districts had policies to address the use of social-networking sites by their students. Fifty percent of respondents said their districts had no such policies and 15 percent weren't sure.

The survey's findings suggest a degree of confusion on the topic that was reflected in forums held during the T+L Conference itself and in a separate webcast hosted by the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) last week.

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