Centerpieces

Editors, high school journalists need your help. First Amendment freedoms are at stake.

Principals and administrators, seeking greater control of their schools, have become emboldened and are putting the red pen to student newspapers as never before, according to Mark Goodman, executive director of the Student Press Law Center.

Consider these incidents this school year:

• Administrators reassigned an Indiana high school newspaper adviser to a new school where she will teach English, not journalism, because of a student editorial advocating tolerance for gays and lesbians.

• Student journalists in Florida clipped a news story about test scores out of the already-printed school newspaper because the principal didn't want to hurt the feelings of students in low-scoring racial and ethnic groups.

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Yet many professional journalists side with administrators. State legislation in Washington protecting high school and college journalists failed in part this spring because of opposition from the state's largest newspaper and at least two others. In 2005, the Michigan Press Association opposed student press legislation in that state.

And while local and state media covered the Indiana case, where the teacher nearly lost her job, national press largely seemed indifferent. USA Today ran a story, but misstated student journalists' rights under the landmark Hazelwood Supreme Court ruling.

But Ken Paulson, USA Today editor and former executive director of the First Amendment Center, is a believer. He beseeched editors at the American Society of Newspaper Editors convention in March to come to the aid of their high school counterparts, saying that the First Amendment pressures facing scholastic journalism are real -- and critical.

Sometimes it takes a high-profile case. The Indiana adviser, Amy Sorrell of Woodlan Junior-Senior High School near Fort Wayne, Ind., was in the middle of her suspension at the time of the ASNE convention. Sorrell was suspended after the story ran Jan. 19, then reassigned to a new school April 26. Administrators said they considered firing her.

Her situation has energized some editors.

"This move sets the First Amendment back a notch," said Mike Smith, a journalist and executive director of the Northwestern University-based Media Management Center. "Students are the victims of this. Talk about your teaching moments."

Smith, a former high school journalist in Sorrell's Indiana district, called the school's action "boneheaded."

When he heard of the situation in March, Dennis Ryerson, editor and vice president of The Indianapolis Star, said: "This really stinks."

The Star and The (Fort Wayne) Journal Gazette, one of Indiana's largest dailies and the school's local newspaper, editorialized strongly against the school district's actions.

Some editors advocate a stronger professional role in high school newsrooms.

"The students of today are the journalists of tomorrow," said Jeff Cohen, editor of the Houston Chronicle and chairman of ASNE's high school journalism committee. "It is essential that editors help pour a strong foundation for them and attract them into a craft that stands for making the world better through the exercise of free speech and free spirit."

Most school newspapers would welcome that support, said H.L. Hall, former president of the Journalism Education Association and executive director of a scholastic journalism group in Tennessee. "It would be fantastic if every professional paper in the United States would form a partnership with one or more schools to help the high school journalism staff both educationally and financially."

Ken Bunting, former editor and now associate publisher of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer said: "I have a hard time understanding editors and news executives who think press freedom for high school and college students isn't their concern."

Bunting's paper came out in favor of the unsuccessful student-protection bill (HB 1307 [PDF]) in Washington state. "When some in our industry brush aside and show indifference to censorship and free speech issues in schools, they are damaging our future, and the future of a democratic society," he said.

Gene Policinski, vice president and executive director of the First Amendment Center, said: "News professionals ought to defend the independence of student media and the necessity to have a program in every high school."

The odds seem to be stacked against the First Amendment in this fight.

State Sen. Rodney Tom, D-Medina, of Washington state was instrumental in the defeat of HB 1307, which would have freed high school and college journalists there of administrative censorship. In an interview with J-Ideas, he said there is no need for high school newspapers to practice real journalism, noting that kids today have the Internet, MySpace and other sites in which to express themselves.

Ongoing studies of high school students, conducted on behalf of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, show that America's high school students may not understand the value of the First Amendment.

A Knight study released in September 2006 showed that 45 percent of high school students feel that the First Amendment goes too far in the rights it guarantees. And more than 75 percent surveyed said they either do not know how they feel about the First Amendment or take its rights for granted.

Not good news for the future of journalism.

Since the Hazelwood Supreme Court decision in 1988, administrators have stretched their reach. The ruling allows for censorship only when administrators can demonstrate a legitimate educational reason. In more and more cases, principals censor stories that are simply controversial or don't reflect well on the school. The disruption the stories would cause, principals often say, could harm the educational process.

"Many school administrators are proud to censor. They wear it like a badge of honor," Goodman told journalists at the ASNE convention March 27. "Our schools have failed with First Amendment education for both students and administrators."

Dave Zeeck, The (Tacoma, Wash.) News Tribune editor and past president of ASNE, also has been a strong voice. "Student media," said Zeeck, in support of the Washington legislation, "should be able to fulfill its mission as independent public forums for student expression, informing and engaging a community."

The Seattle Times, much to the dismay of student journalists and others toiling to pass HB 1307 in Washington this winter, suggested in an editorial that kids should do as professionals do: Engage in "constant head-butting" and "give and take" with administrators and principals.

That might work with adults. But a school is a different matter. It is not reasonable to expect that an adviser, let alone a high school student, can challenge a principal, often the source of arbitrary power within the schoolhouse gate.

Student journalists are in the process of learning the First Amendment. Student journalism is education in action. Censorship subverts the true learning of journalism.

"Too many of us forget," Paulson said, "that the First Amendment is not handed to a young person along with a high school diploma. These core liberties belong to every American, and it's the job of a free press to stand up for all journalists, whether they're drawing a paycheck or not."

Warren Watson is director of the J-Ideas program, a First Amendment and student journalism institute based in the department of journalism at Ball State University. He worked as a daily newspaper reporter and editor for 26 years at newspapers large and small, and is a former vice president at the American Press Institute. And, yes, he was editor of his high school newspaper in Dover, N.H., nearly 40 years ago.