Can educators use Facebook to connect with students and their families?

What do you think of this?

http://www.schooltechnology.org/2010/08/18/creating-facebook-page-school-edtech-elearning/

I don’t use Facebook, so I don’t know how this would work.  Obviously personal information should not be shared over a social network, but everywhere I go people (or family, like my mom) talk about how I missed public information; like missing my cousins party because my family uses Facebook to get the message out.

Could teachers use Facebook to collaborate with a larger community?