Satire: Easy to confuse when used without context
by Tom Gayda
Aw, satire. So fun and entertaining when done well. How many times have I been taken aback for a second by an Onion headline? More than I care to share! Satire can be very powerful when done with purpose, but satire for the sake of satire often falls flat.
Model ethical guidelines for satire
Satire can make for entertaining writing, however two major points should be considered when discussing the inclusion of satire: 1: Will readers get “it?” and 2: Even if readers do get “it,” are you walking a fine line with the type of content expected of your publication and that which isn’t necessarily journalistic?
While there may be nothing inherently unethical about including satirical content in a student publication, is that the type of content the publication should be known for?
Consider this: does the nightly news ever take a segment for anchors to report on something that didn’t really happen? The back page of the Washington Post run Onion-like stories? Certainly there is a place for satire, but is the legitimate news source the correct place?
Staff manual process
Discuss the need for policies and information about satire depending on the type of media you are. While satire might be appropriate for a literary magazine or humor magazine, does it have a place in the newspaper or on the website?
Suggestions
• Satire can be an effective tool when writing an opinion piece. Consider limiting satire to the opinion pages, where it is clearly labeled opinion.
- Satire online can create issues. Consider a former student searching for school news and comes upon a satirical piece that isn’t obviously satirical by just Googling the school name. Is the desire to include satire in a legitimate news source worth the confusion? Is satire journalistic?
- Some schools produce special edition papers for April Fools Day. Imagine The New York Times doing the same. Hard to do, isn’t it? Why sacrifice the integrity of the paper for fun? Perhaps if satire is so important, the staff should produce a separate humor publication that doesn’t conflict with news. Staffs often think everyone will get the joke, but that’s not always the case. Further, the next time you do try to cover hard-hitting news the readers might think back to how you took everything as a joke the last issue.
- Spend time discussing what your role as a journalist is. Are you a trained satirical writer? Just as we would advise against horoscopes and advice columns as teens often aren’t qualified to provide such content, how does satire fit in with a serious journalistic program?
Resources
Introduction to Satire, JEA
Avoiding Libel in Satire, JEA
Ethics and Satire, JEA
Satire Writing Tips
How to Start Writing Satire
To find the rest of the Foundations ethical guidelines and more, go here and here.
Read MoreBuild a strong foundation by locking in
pieces of the puzzle called journalism
Part 1 of a series on fitting the pieces of the journalism puzzle:
Knowing where to start
by Candace and John Bowen
Preparing student media for a new year often begins with design- and theme-planning. For a good number this includes summer workshops for training in reporting platforms, visual reporting approaches and the latest in apps and across-platform developments.
We hope such training also includes the basics of law and ethics. Often, we fear it does not.
Because we believe a basic understanding of legal and ethical issues is key to the puzzle of a successful year of sound journalistic media, we’d recommend the solid foundation of journalism basics to support the 2015-16 year and beyond.
Ensure students understand their legal rights and responsibilities before publication and provide them with activities and resources to prepare them for the rigors of publishing and decision-making.
Our training list to start the year and continue through it would be organized something like this:
• Outline the goals and mission of your student media
Like a road map, a goals and mission statement frames direction for student media. A mission statement presents the underlying principles student media adhere to. Goals suggest specific accomplishments used in following the mission. Both establish the how and why for students and communities alike. Like a road map, students may choose different paths from year to year but the outcome stays fixed: thorough, accurate and credible journalism.
Resources:
– New values (JEA SPRC Press Rights Minute)
– April Fool’s Editions, “Don’t be a fool” (JEA SPRC Press Rights Minute)
– Balance and objectivity (JEA SPRC Press Rights Minute)
– The role of student media (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– The role of the adviser (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Mission statement development (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– JEA Model Mission statement (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
• Train staff and editors in legal principles across platforms
Even though students might embrace online media, legal and ethical basics provide a framework for digital media now and what is yet to come. While there might be some changes, the basics of unprotected speech and the importance of knowing legal background won’t change in the foreseeable future.
Resources:
– Law of Student Press, book from the Student Press Law Center, also available on Kindle
– Student Press Law Center
– JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
– Public forum overview (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Principal’s Guide to Scholastic Journalism (Quill & Scroll and JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Legal Guides (Student Press Law Center)
• Ensure board- and/or publication-level policies are in place
Strong board of education level and publication editorial policies reinforce principles student media use to reach their mission. Strong and effective editorial policies, carefully worded, protect not only student media but also school systems if legal issues arise. Lack of careful wording is worse than no policy at all. Policies reflect the publication’s values and commitments. Ideally, the most effective policies establish student media as designated public forums, without prior review and where students make all content decisions.
Resources
– The Foundations of Journalism: policies, ethics and staff manuals (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Board of education- and publication level- models (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Board media policies (JEA SPRC Press Rights Minute)
– Why avoiding prior review is educationally sound (Quill & Scroll Principal’s Guide)
– Eliminating prior review (JEA SPRC Press Rights Minute)
• Train staff and editors in ethical principles across platforms
Even though students might embrace online media, ethical basics provide a compass for print and digital media now and for what is yet to come. Practice in and knowledge of ethical critical thinking provides principles for journalistically responsible reporting. Reinforcement of ethical practices builds student publications steeped in ethical fitness.
Resources:
– JEA Adviser Code of Ethics (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Online ethics guidelines for student media (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Questions student staffs should discuss before entering the social media environment (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– SPJ Code of ethics (Society of Professional Journalists)
– Critical thinking, ethics and knowledge-based practice in visual media (Journalist’s Resource)
• Establish, for online or print, a content verification process
While this might have been part of skills-oriented summer workshop training and practice, its importance goes without question. Verification, credibility, context and accuracy are the reporting cornerstones of journalism. Each is rooted in establishing a rigorous ethical process.
Resources:
– Planning and gathering information/producing content (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Getting it right (JEA SPRC Press Rights Minute)
– Journalism as a discipline of verification (American Press Institute)
– Verification (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
• Clarify who owns content
To avoid issues if someone tries to sell your yearbook content online or you want to sell photos, determine ahead of time who owns the content of student work. It’s important to plan this ahead of incidents.
Resources:
– Who Owns Student Content? (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
– Back to School: Who Owns What? (Student Press Law Center)
– Contribution to Collective Work U.S. Copyright Office
• Develop guidelines for handing takedown demands if online
Fielding requests for takedown demands is increasingly a decision student media have to make, either from reporters after they have left school or from sources because they do not like the story. Choices are limited, and involve ethical thinking.
Resources:
–Takedown demands (JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee)
–Responding to takedown demands (Student Press Law Center)
–Takedown requests (JEA SPRC Press Rights Minute)
Without an understanding of rights and responsibilities – the “could we?” and “should we?” of producing media, staffs can have the most attractive layouts imaginable and captivating story-telling, but they could still make legal and ethical mistakes that would ruin their chance to produce anything else for their audience.
Part 1: Build a strong foundation
Part 2: Careful preparation creates strong mission statements
Part 3: Points to avoid
Part 4: Fitting the pieces into a strong Foundation
Read More
Students making content decisions – 1 Administrative review – 0
by Candace Perkins Bowen
Even media staffs that have been the well-respected voice of a large, diverse student body sometimes run into problems with administrators. And sometimes a few tweaks of the editorial policy or staff manual could get them through the rough spots and apparently back on track to publish what they know their readers need and want to know.
Censorship and broadcasting video
Title
Censorship and broadcasting video
by Chris Waugaman
Primary Common Core state standards addressed
(see http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy )
- CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.11-12.2a Introduce a topic; organize complex ideas, concepts, and information so that each new element builds on that which precedes it to create a unified whole; include formatting (e.g., headings), graphics (e.g., figures, tables), and multimedia when useful to aiding comprehension.
- CCSS.ELA-Literacy.W.11-12.4 Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.
Brief goal/outcome statement:
This would be intended to be a lesson I would use with producers in my broadcasting class or even my online editors who often use video and stream events.
- Students will learn terms that familiarize them with censorship in video and radio.
- Students will use their skills at gathering information and using online sources to guide them in times of legal uncertainty.
- Students will learn how to make critical decisions regarding their press rights by applying the case outcomes they learn in this lesson.
| • COMPREHENSION | • PRACTICE | •APPLICATION | • REFLECTION |
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· Gathering Information · Documentation · Note-taking
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· Using web as resource · Responding to questions · Documentation |
· Using modern events to make decisions for their staff
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· Describe the process of video censorship · Discuss other possible scenarios that can occur
|
Unit: Scholastic Press Rights
Lesson – Censorship and Broadcasting
Length of lesson: One 90 minute block (35 minutes instruction/45 minutes activity/10 minute reflection)
Resources/Equipment:
Handouts/Internet/Computer
- Introduction & Instruction: The instruction aspect of this lesson includes instruction in what is the FCC and how is video normally regulated. Students will understand what most news broadcast organizations are required to consider when broadcasting.
There will also be a clear indication of what is required to be censored with video. It would be helpful if students are familiar with the Hazelwood court case and the Tinker court case before this lesson, but it is not a requirement.
Who governs free speech on radio and television? What is censorable on television?
https://www.fcc.gov/encyclopedia/faqs-television-and-cable
For most high school programs, students publish videos online. The FCC does not govern such publication; however, students can still make decisions with this knowledge.
With the following case students should consider a few factors in relating to the content and situation at hand:
- Is the video part of a school sponsored publication or is it for an individual?
- What is the publication’s forum status?
- Is there a valid educational purpose for censoring? (Hazelwood)
- Can the administration predict a reasonable disruption of the school activities or will it present an invasion of privacy? (Tinker)
In the following case, a student shot video of a post-fight activity in a school. That camera was confiscated along with the video. Read the following account or what happened, and the SPLC response to determine if the student’s rights were violated.
Seizing video of a fight
http://www.splc.org/article/2004/08/officials-seize-video-of-fight-from-student
Article about video of school fight and SPLC position:
http://www.splc.org/article/2004/04/n-y-high-school-principal-confiscates-tape-of-school-fight
- We will briefly explain what happened in this case from 2004.
- We will cover the Privacy Protection Act and how it might apply to this case. http://www.splc.org/article/2002/01/student-media-guide-to-the-privacy-protection-act
- Next I ask the students to identify what in the school handbook should protect this student journalist.
- As a final element to the 35-minute discussion I ask the students to conclude if this scenario impacts our publication and work.
Key pages such as the SPLC web page will be introduced as a primary source for research as it involves the law of the student press.
List of other helpful websites:
http://www.collegefreedom.org
http://www.firstamendmentschools.org/
http://teachfirstamendment.org/
http://www.freedomforum.org/
http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/
http://www.nfoic.org/
http://jeapressrights.org/
http://www.splc.org
Sometimes this will take longer than 35 minutes.
- Practice: Students will pick from one of the following cases chronicled on the SPLC site.
• http://www.splc.org/blog/splc/2015/06/judge-rules-security-videos-subject-to-ferpa-protections
http://www.splc.org/blog/splc/2014/11/connecticut-school-security-video-ruled-exempt-from-ferpa
• http://www.splc.org/blog/splc/2014/02/students-lewd-video-about-teacher-provokes-errant-wisconsin-ruling-applying-online-harassment-law
• http://www.splc.org/article/2004/04/ill-school-refuses-to-allow-students-to-air-video-tribute-of-deceased-student
• http://www.splc.org/article/2004/06/calif-university-bars-student-from-airing-beheading-video-on-school-sponsored-tv
• http://www.splc.org/article/2015/02/western-illinois-u-editor-reinstated-after-suspension-for-freelancing-video-of-campus-brawl
• http://www.splc.org/article/2012/03/u-of-rhode-island-proposal-would-bar-photos-video-of-sensitive-material
They will read the article and answer the questions below to the best of their ability.
Students need to be prepared to briefly describe what happened in the case they have chosen to the class. They can brief the class by presenting their responses to the questions.
• Who does the case involve?
• What happened in the case? How does it involve video?
• Who has made the decision?
• Was this case similar to any other cases you have heard about? What was it?
• How does this situation relate to Hazelwood or Tinker?
• Does the video include anything that is obscene, indecent, or profane?
• How could this case set a precedent?
• Name and document any other sources from the web that pertain to this case.
III. Application: Have students decide together which case could most likely occur this school year.
Students should outline a policy in their staff manual that will inform students how to proceed should a similar scenario to the one that they have researched could develop.
The policy should be agreed upon by the entire staff and be introduced to the administration, along with any updates on the staff manual, for the year.
- Reflection: Have students write in their logs details about what new considerations they have thought of after learning about video censorship. It can be as structured as you would like or as open as “what did you learn during the process of researching your topic that you did not realize would happen simply by following the examples I explained at the beginning of the lesson.”
- Assessment: Credit for completing questions on case. Credit for hypothetical scenario. Credit for reflection in daily log. Each assignment is worth 33% of the total unit grade. See RUBRIC ON NEXT PAGE.
- Assessment: Credit for completing questions on researching topic. Credit for hypothetical scenario. Credit for reflection in daily log. Each assignment is worth 33 percent of the total unit grade.
| Grade | A (100) | B (90) | C (80) | D (70) |
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Questions on Selected Topic
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All questions are answered thoroughly with great detail included about case and sources (Special Attention Ques 6).
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All questions are answered adequately with some detail included about case and sources (Special Attention Ques 6).
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Most questions are answered. Question 6 must be answered.
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Some questions are answered. Question 6 must be answered. |
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Paper with Scenario
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The created scenario must be on topic with a great amount of detail included about case and sources (Special Attention Ques 6).
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The created scenario must be on topic with enough details to answer questions from activity one (Special Attention Ques 6).
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The created scenario addresses topic and answers most of the questions from activity one (Special Attention Ques 6).
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A scenario is created and it answers some of the questions from activity one (Special Attention Ques 6). |
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Reflection
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The reflection includes details about the process of online research. Some details are included. It reflects an understanding of the process and a response to the activity, |
The reflection addresses the process of online research. It reflects an understanding of the process and a response to the activity, |
The reflection shows an understanding of the process and a response to the activity, |
It responds to the activity, |
Read More
2015 Constitution Day lessons
Please contact me if you have any questions or feedback about the lessons or how to implement them. For a video about the lessons, go to https://youtu.be/39c8sZVmT20.
The SPRC works to provide information and resources on legal and ethical issues to journalism students, teachers and administrators. SPRC members also work to promote the First Amendment rights of students across the nation.
The lessons
• Celebrating Constitution Day, by Lori Keekley.This activity encourages the English, social studies and journalism teachers to engage students in exploring the Constitution’s relevance to their daily lives, facts about the Constitution and understanding the amendments to the Constitution
• Crossword Puzzle, by Lori Keekley. For fun activities to celebrate Constitution Day in a number of curricular areas.
• Understanding the perils of prior review and restraint, by Jeff Kocur. Click here for the activity. For additional resources and model ethical guidelines and staff manual procedures for this, go here and here.
• Listening with a skeptical ear: checking source accuracy and credibility by John Bowen. With candidates jostling for positions in the 2016 presidential election and numerous state, local races taking shape and issues developing readers and viewers face an onslaught of information not limited to politics. Student journalists must able to separate valid from questionable information and know how to determine if sources and their messages are credible.
• Where should journalists draw the line? by John Bowen. By examining The Huffington Post’s announcement it would only report Donald Trump’s bid for the Republican nomination for president on the entertainment pages, students can further explore ethical issues pertaining to the decision while again examining the role of media.
• Should there be limits to taking a stance in front page design? by John Bowen. This lesson examines the ethical and philosophical issues as to whether it is OK for a student newspaper to Rainbow Filter its Twitter profile picture or show any unlabeled viewpoint.
• Censorship and broadcast video by Chris Waugaman. This lesson would be intended to be a lesson used with producers in a broadcasting class or even anonline editors who often use video and stream events. Students will learn terms that familiarize them with censorship in video and radio. Students will also learn how to make critical decisions regarding their press rights by applying the case outcomes they learn in this lesson.
To see past years’ lessons, go here.
Please send any feedback to keekley@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you!
Lori Keekley
For JEA’s Scholastic Press Rights Committee and the Constitution Day Committee
Constitution Day Committee
John Bowen, MJE, Kent State University (OH)
Lori Keekley, MJE, St. Louis Park High School (MN)
Jeff Kocur, CJE, Hopkins High School (MN)
Chris Waugaman, Prince George High School (VA)
Content list
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