Durham Teachers Network

Social Forums

• How to register
• How to use the Forums
• How to delete your account

In order to fully protect the members of this site, the Forums will temporarily sit inside a protected folder to prevent eroneous sign-ups.

 

When we make them 'live' you will temporarily need two sets of login credentials:

1. To access the protected folder (this will be sent to verified users)
2. Your own (self-registered) username and password

 

Once we have registered the core users we will be able to switch off folder protection & self-registration and will add any new users manually - this will make it easier to access the Forums in future with only one login required.

 

The Social Forum software has now been installed, but is not currently configured for users.

 

Any existing university staff member with login credentials can now view the Forum environment.

Eligibility

In order to be eligible for membership of the Durham Teachers Network, you must fall into one of the following groups of users:

• School of Education student at Durham University
• Graduated education student from Durham University
• Current teacher in a NE (UK) school or academy catering to either primary and/or secondary pupils
• Current educational support staff in a NE (UK) school or academy catering to either primary and/or secondary pupils
• Current leader in a NE (UK) school or academy catering to either primary and/or secondary pupils
• Staff member of the School of Education at Durham University
• Other related stakeholders may also be eligible - complete the form below and we will contact you

 

Forum Policies and Etiquette

By applying to join the Durham Network social forum you agree to abide by the guidelines on etiquette and associated member penalties as published here: Forum Policies and Etiquette

 

Apply

Complete the following form using your current educational email address e.g. firstname.lastname@schoolname.org and we will provide you with access credentials for you to create your own social forum account. You will normally receive access within 3 working days (often same day).

Sign up

Once you have received access to the Durham Teachers Network you will need to create your own account by clicking on the Sign Up button at the top of the page and completing the requested information.

 

Tags

All of the content is organised into categories using Tags. At least one Tag must be applied to all new posts and the system will allow you to see all content that has been posted or you can filter by category by simply clicking on that Tag name:

The current list of Tags (at the time of writing) is:

• New Users (some extra new member info)

• General (anything that doesn't neatly fit elsewhere)

• CPD (any links, resources, discussion or courses relating to Continuing Professional Development)

• ASK DTN (ask anything of the Durham Teachers Network - respond to questions from others)

• Stories (stories and case studies from your practice)
• Suggestions (suggest anything that will improve the Durham Teachers Network)

 

The posts behind these tags can be access from every page of the Forums, as can All Discussions which includes all of the site's posts.

 

Start a new discussion

Click on the big green Start a Discussion button and add a Title for your post, the text you want to share, add an image or link if required AND choose at least one Tag to enable the post to be filed and discovered:

Reply to existing posts

When reading an existing post (or reply) you will see the Write a Reply... text displayed as a link below the content. Clicking on this will present you with an input box that looks very similar to the "Start a new discussion" form. This time you do NOT need to choose any Tags as they have been applied to the original post:

Like posts

Each post and reply has a Like link when you hover over or select the content. Once content has been Liked, the link changes to Unlike so that you can reverse your  decision.

@Mentions

As with most other social networks, you can @mention another user to alert them to a post, call them into a conversation, give them credit for ideas/content or thank them for something.

 

Simply use @ followed by their forum username. When you start typing a username (after the @) the system will list users with those letters.

Report Content

When you hover over or select a post/reply - you will see a three dots menu. Clicking on this brings up the Flag menu option.

 

Clicking on Flag allows you to report content under the following categories:

• Off-topic - post needs moving to another Tag
• Innappropriate - content that is innapropriate, abusive or violates the community guidelines
• Spam - adverts or repeat posting of the same content
• Other - tell why you think the content should not be posted

In all cases you have the option to provide additional information.

 

This Flagging will be sent to the site Admins for investigation and action. Your reporting of content will remain anonymous from all other users and only the site Admins will be aware of your report.

 

Repeated actionable reports against a user may see Admins apply sanctions against the user including (but not limited to) a written warning, temporary suspension or permanent deletion of their account.