ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom
http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/Default622.htm
Their section on 'filters and filtering' begins:
Proxy services can get about anywhere, but filters often react by
blocking those too.


At middle/high school level ... I just wish teachers would catch up with
online, subscription tools.  The number of times students tell us they
CAN'T use anything online, "it has to be from a book!" Either teachers or
their communication to students are so muddied about what is the open
Internet, what licensed, solid resources .. that students are actually put
at a disadvantage in these "anti-plagarism" assignments.

At  the public library we often encounter the same misunderstanding that database resources
aren't "books" or periodicals" even when in full text with complete citations. There is so much
education to do for students, parents, and teachers...and we public libraries just don't have the
means to do this alone..so all our partners, especially at the school media centers, need to help
us out. We educate one at  a time, and rarely get to do a whole class. However, here in Boise,
we are providing an increasing number of library tours that include a library orientation and
explanation of databases. We seem to be able to reach the private schools and some of the
charter schools this way. The public schools have such tight limitations on field trips that
they rarely get to visit us at the 6th grade level and up as a group. So we keep spreading the
word, and hope that our new users begin to understand the wealth of resources that tax dollars
have already paid for. I feel there is a huge gap between understanding digital resources and
being able to utilize the technology behind it...


What two tools do our students (at least in the community colleges I have worked the reference desk
and taught orientations in) overwhelmingly use first when researching an assignment:  Google and Wikipedia. 
It matters little what we say about what authoritative tools (Gale, Ebsco, Proquest, Wilson DBs, etc.) to use, Google and Wikipedia are first choice. 
So, what do we do?  What we always do?  Teach students (or any patron) as best we can to be critical,
to look for authoritative, validated, quality info.  What we, as librarians, should not do is stick our heads in the sand. 
I have suggested to at least a couple of community colleges that they put links to Google, Yahoo Search,
and Wikipedia on their main search pages, along with the links to the catalog and the databases.


Parry, David. Wikipedia and the New Curriculum:
Digital Literacy Is Knowing How We Store What We Know. Science Progress. February 2008.
"It is irresponsible for educational institutions not to teach new knowledge technologies such as Wikipedia...we
do a fundamental disservice to our students if we continue to propagate old methods of knowledge creation
and archivization without also teaching them how these structures are changing, and, more importantly,
how they will relate to knowledge creation and dissemination in a fundamentally different way."


An article about Wikipedia where the author stated:
"It is irresponsible for educational institutions not to teach new knowledge technologies such as Wikipedia."
I've seen a lot of cases where people summarily dismiss any use of Wikipedia.
Interestingly, Wikipedia itself offers a caveat for using Wikipedia for research projects:
"As with any source, especially one of unknown authorship, you should be wary and independently verify
the accuracy of Wikipedia information if possible. For many purposes, but particularly in academia, Wikipedia
may not be considered an acceptable source; indeed, some professors and teachers may throw Wikipedia-sourced
material away out of hand. This is especially true when it is used uncorroborated. We advise special caution
when using Wikipedia as a source for research projects. However, we are also confident that Wikipedia provides good overviews of most topics that it covers"
Wikipedians seem to have given this issue some thought. Before dismissing Wikipedia as worthless, academics
might be interested in the following Wikipedia articles. They may not change anyone's mind, but the criticism of Wikipedia may be more well-informed.
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Researching_with_Wikipedia
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reliability_of_Wikipedia
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Wikipedia