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Working with a board-approved policy

Posted by on Apr 7, 2015 in Blog, Ethical Issues, Legal issues, News, Scholastic Journalism | 0 comments

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Policy
Staffs sprclogoshould include the district policy in their staff manuals if available. If not, they should work towards reaching agreement with the administration and school board for a policy all can agree makes the most educational sense. Three examples of these board policies are available, each with that same basic premise but with increasingly more detail and explanation of philosophy. Each, however, begins with the statement that all student media are designated public forums where students make all content decisions.

It’s important to stick to the basics for the board-approved policies. If ethical or journalistic practice decisions are included in an official school policy, the limitations they describe take on a whole new significance. Now they are not just for the staff to enforce but, by implication, are provisions that school administrators could use to discipline a publication staff or adviser or even to censor content that they believe violates what is written. Including a subjective ethical determination in a school policy gives the school the ability to overrule the ethical decisions of student editors.

Lacking a board-approved policy, student media staffs should create one of their own. (LINK) Although this doesn’t have the legal weight of a board-approved policy, it should state the publication is a designate public forum for student expression where students make all content decisions. This shows how the media staffs operate and could show they are forums “in practice.” While not as solid a legal foundation as “in policy,” courts have recognized this as free speech protection under Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier.

Ethical guidelines
Students should understand that while they can and should adopt best practices and ethical guidelines for their publication, the school district’s or school board’s media policy (if one exists) could impact student editors’ ethical decisions. This reality does not preclude students from exercising their best ethical judgment. Rather, it is an incentive for students to advocate their role and a district-level policy that protects them.

Staff manual process
A student media staff manual should include copies of the school district or school board media policy as well as media editorial policy. Furthermore, the staff manual may provide procedures for students addressing the school administration in the case of a disagreement or policy confusion. Students should also consider including in the manual some guidelines for proposing policy changes to the school board or petitioning the district for a policy to improve on what they have (e.g., How does a student request to be put on the agenda for a school board meeting?).

Suggestions
• Obtain a copy of the school district’s media or student expression policy.
• Compare district policy to your staff procedure and identify potential areas for misunderstanding or conflict (e.g., the district policy includes more restrictions on student speech/press than actually occurs).
• Make a plan to advocate change in the district’s policy that would align it more closely with how the staff really operates.
• Recognize that student media staffs, not the adviser, are best suited to advocate their role. Advisers must navigate a difficult line as employee and should not be put in a position to defend student work.
• Consider advocating a state law that would protect student free expression rights.

Resources
Lesson: Developing a Presentation for Your School Board, Journalism Education Association
Rethinking Your Forum Status, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
What Do I Do When I’m Censored?, Student Press Law Center
Model Guidelines for High School Student Media, Student Press Law Center
Model Legislation to Protect Student Free Expression Rights, Student Press Law Center
JEA Model Editorial Policy, Journalism Education Association
Audio: Board Media Policies, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee, Press Rights Minute
Audio: The Tinker Standard, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee, Press Rights Minute
Audio: The Hazelwood Decision, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee, Press Rights Minute
Audio: Combined Editorial Policy, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee, Press Rights Minute
Understanding the Difference Between a School Board policy and Publication Policy/practice, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
Deciding Which Forum Best Serves Your Students – and your Community, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
Questions to Answer in Policy Development, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
Philosophical Questions About Policy Development, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
Importance of Designated Public Forum Status, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
Other Policy Considerations, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee

To return to Policy and Ethics sitemap, go here.

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Building student media foundations
with policy and ethics

Posted by on Apr 7, 2015 in Ethical Issues, Legal issues, News, Scholastic Journalism, Teaching | 0 comments

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Help with crafting policies
and ethical guidelines for student media

sprclogoThis project is a two-fold effort to combine policy, ethics and staff manual procedure into an integrated process where policy sets the stage for ethical guidelines and ethical guidelines shape staff manual procedure.

Our interest in developing the project began when we found several instances when a school administrator in a potential censorship situation wanted to enforce — even punish — students for not following ethics statements because policy, ethics and staff manual points were all intermixed in a common document that the school administrator presumed he had the authority to enforce based on his interpretation.

Hence, our work ties the three elements together – principle, process and procedure – but as statements that separately outline the ideas behind what staffs do.

  • This means “principle” is a student media policy.One approved at the board level is best and should be simple and straightforward, acknowledging the media are designated forums of student expression, where students make final content decisions. (See examples following)

Lacking that approval, a similar editorial policy at the publication level is useful, too, because, according to court decisions, operating as a designated public forum in practice is also a good way to protect student free speech rights.

  • The “process” is the ethical guidelines. Unlike laws, ethical situations are right vs. right dilemmas and not right vs. wrong. Ethical guidelines are recommendations and thus cannot be broken as laws can. These guidelines help students decide how they operate on a daily basis, and their application is left in the hands of the students.
  • The “procedure” is the staff manual, the specific actions and processes the staff uses regularly – how letters are handled, what happens when a source wants to be anonymous – all the things that ensure a staff operates in a professional and credible manner. These also are exclusively enforced by the student staff itself.

The idea is not to dictate policy, ethics guidelines or staff manual models but to provide a menu of items student staffs can choose.

For example, five editorial policy models are part of this project, four for board-level policies  and one for a publication-level  editorial policy.

All stress student media should be “designated public forums for student expression where students make all content decisions without prior review by school officials.”

[pullquote]Five editorial policy models are part of this project, four for board-level policies and one for a publication-level editorial policy.

All stress student media should be “designated public forums for student expression where students make all content decisions without prior review by school officials.”[/pullquote]

Students and advisers can then add from a separate menu of ethical guidelines and staff manual procedures. Each ethical principle offers staff manual suggestions that stem from its premise.

This separates what must be followed – the board-approved policy – from all the other guidelines, practices and procedures that may change some from year to year and staff to staff. By doing this, staffs can shape their media with roadmaps they have devised.

Resources
Ethics codes are invaluable in student journalism, but not as a guide for punishment, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
• For a sitemap of inclusive materials, go here.
• To go to How to Use the List of Ethics and Staff manuals, go here.
• Go here for a list of General Resources.

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Media-level editorial policies

Posted by on Apr 7, 2015 in Ethical Issues, Legal issues, News, Scholastic Journalism, Teaching | 0 comments

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Ethics guidelines
Media-level esprclogoditorial policies aren’t as much legal protection as the board-level policies, but they could show how students operate “in practice” and thus might be viewed as some protection. Thus they are a must for student media. JEA’s Model Editorial Policy is a good example because it adds discussion points such as letters to the editor, handling coverage of death and advertising.

Any of the board-level policy models can be adapted for use at the media level. All policies, including the JEA model, stress student media as designated public forums in which students make all content decisions without prior review by school officials.

The JEA model includes detailed language and provides direction for process and principles. It expands on the Student Press Law Center’s Model Guidelines for High School Media, with the kind of situations student media face, which makes it preferable at the level of the individual medium.

Ethical guidelines and staff manual procedures should be separate sections from either board-level or student media-level policies. This way student editors can update their staff manuals to meet changing needs and situations.

Staff manual process
A school without policies can cause confusion and misunderstanding for readers and participants. Media-level editorial policies should be direct, clear and understandable to people of all ages. These policies reinforce ethical guidelines, and a staff manual rooted in ethical approaches outlines their implementation on a daily basis.

Media-level editorial policies should be reviewed and endorsed yearly to keep them current as the active framework for student media. Any student media policy established without the input of its student practitioners is both a missed opportunity and a recipe for mistakes. By evaluating the inclusion of these policies, students will better understand their mission and expectations.

When finished, media-level policies should be shared with school and outside communities so all parties understand the principles and processes the journalism program follows.

Suggestions
Even if staffs incorporate the JEA model editorial policy as a framework, students should work to establish clear guidelines for their decision-making.

In creating the ideal forum statement, consistent for all student media at either media or board level, staffs should include: “[NAME OF STUDENT MEDIA] are designated public forums for student expression in which students make all final content decisions without prior review from school officials.”

Such a media-level policy, board-approved or in practice, would be designed to protect all parties in case of legal issues

Return to sitemap.

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Policy sets standards and staff manuals
ethically carry them out

Posted by on Apr 7, 2015 in Blog, Ethical Issues, Legal issues, News, Scholastic Journalism, Teaching | 0 comments

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sprclogoby John Bowen
It’s 3 p.m. Friday, and the final deadline is in four hours.

At issue is a package covering a controversial subject of growing importance in the community.

The staff is divided. Some want to publish the story because it is controversial, important and will create needed community discussion. Others say there has to be more balance and perspective, with all credible sides represented. Production skids to a halt as the debate heats up.

Larger questions exist:
• What are the publication’s guidelines for handling controversial topics?
• What are the dangers of negative community and administration reaction, even intervention?
• Should anonymous sources be used? How to trust them?

Most helpful to this staff would be a strong board-level policy supporting student expression. Next would be a process-oriented and ethics-based staff manual.

Having editorial guidelines and staff manual, though, does not mean they are right or effective.

In the last year, we have seen:
• Instances where having too much information in a policy can lead to unforeseen consequences, including censorship;
• Instances where wrong wording created inaccurate interpretation and potential intervention from outside the staff;
• Instances where items presented with policy can lead to procedures interpreted as policy.

[pullquote]

We now see a need for strong board-level media policies. We see a need for separately sectioned, but linked ethics statements and staff manuals.

That led us to new models for media policies and staff manuals and a project we call Foundations of Journalism Package.

[/pullquote]

Those instances led to a change in thinking about editorial policies and staff manuals.

We continue to see a need for strong board-level media policies. But we also see a need for separately sectioned, but linked ethics statements and staff manuals.

That leads us to new models for media policies and staff manuals and a project we call Foundations of Journalism Package.

The project has three components: policy, ethical guidelines and staff manuals.

Editorial policies – the principles

Editorial policies, says Mark Goodman, Knight Chair in Scholastic Journalism at Kent State University and former executive director of the Student Press Law Center, are like double-edged swords.

“Carefully drafted,” Goodman said, “policies can be used to cut the bonds of censorship. If not carefully worded, however, they can ultimately create more trauma for advisers and students than having no policy at all.”

“If your school has one giving student editors content control,” Goodman said, “that policy can effectively exclude your student media from the limitations of Hazelwood.”

Ethical process       

Ethical principles, rooted in legal principles, set a publication’s ethical compass and create what Rushworth Kidder, founder of the Institute for Global Ethics, called “ethical fitness.”

Right-versus-wrong choices, Kidder said, were matters of law. Ethics involve right-versus-right choices.

“Right versus right, then,” he wrote, “is at the heart of our toughest choices. Right-versus-right teach us depth in shaping our deepest values.”

The ethics portion of the package should be designed to guide decision-making for student media. Guidelines should be presented as “should” statements, not “will” or “must.” An ethical code is not legally enforceable because it represents guidelines, not rules.

Staff manuals

A strong and effective staff manual implements policy principles and ethical guidelines. It is the procedure that stems from these and describes day-to-day actions.

Staff manuals are like working encyclopedias: They provide information as wide as handling sources or as narrow as how to interview children.

Staff manuals change as students or advisers change. Because change only affects the staff, manual procedures should not appear with board policy. Each year, staff members have the opportunity – and obligation – to revisit the staff manual to see it serves their needs and those of their audiences.

A good staff manual creates a road map students can easily apply.

Look for our Foundations of Journalism Package in the upcoming days for our policy-ethics-staff manuals project.

Look for our Foundations of Journalism Package in the upcoming days for our policy-ethics-staff manuals project.

Responsible journalism, truly the cornerstone of democracy, starts at the scholastic media level. We hope our updated policy, ethics and staff manual changes enhance that process.

Over the past year, the SPRC has seen situations where unclear policies, sometimes mixed with staff manual language and ethical guidelines, have created misunderstanding between advisers, students and administrators. We have designed a Journalism Foundations Package to attempt to eliminate those misunderstandings.

Look for its posting using this graphic in the
next several days.

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Getting your editorial policy
the right way

Posted by on Sep 3, 2014 in Blog, Hazelwood, Legal issues, News, Scholastic Journalism, Teaching | 0 comments

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by Candace Perkins Bowen, MJE

Part 1 of a 2-part blog on teacher plagiarism and copyright issues

Teachers can be the world’s worst thieves without ever meaning to be.

We’ve all done it — sometimes out of panicked need, sometimes out of ignorance, sometimes because we think our classroom is some sort of copyright-free zone.

So just what CAN teachers use that others have created? Just what is fair use in the classroom? What may be legal but not exactly ethical for us to use? This is the first of a two-part series concerning OUR use of others’ creative work.

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