Teachers banned from 'friending' students in New York

New York City teachers have been forbidden from hitting the "Add Friend" button on their students' Facebook pages.

Thanks to a new list of guidelines released by the Education Department on Tuesday, public school teachers may no longer contact students through personal pages on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, according to the New York Times.

The newspaper said that while the new employee guidelines don't ban teachers from using social media, they should only communicate to their students through pages set up for classroom use or via professional accounts, LA Times reported.

Professional pages are those devoted to "classroom business like homework and study guides," the New York Times said.

Before teachers set up their page they must get a supervisor's permission parents will also have to sign a consent form before their children can participate.

The measures were put in place in light of increasing concerns about teacher-student conduct.

Often, inappropriate relationships involve or begin on social media sites, a department investigator told the paper. (ANI