Prior review/restraint
Ethical guidelines
Students learn more when they make all publication choices. Prior review and restraint do not teach students to produce higher quality journalism.
The only way to teach students to take responsibility for their decisions is to give them the responsibility to make those decisions freely. No administrator has ever shown any educational value in prior review.
Continued democracy depends on students understanding all voices have a right to be heard and assuring all viewpoints have a say in their communities.
Staff manual process
The student editorial board should design an editorial policy that establishes student media as designated public forums for student expression where students make all final decisions of content.
The student editorial board should also study JEA and SPLC materials, statements and lessons to build educational arguments against prior review.
Resources
Prior review button on menu bar, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
JEA Board Statement on Prior Review, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
Building a Climate of Trust Can Ease Prior Review, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
Seeking a Cure for the Hazelwood Blues: A call to Action, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee
Audio: Panic Button, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee, Press Rights Minute
Audio: Eliminating Prior Review, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee, Press Rights Minute
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Read MoreStaff conduct
Ethical guidelines
Students participating in scholastic media should hold themselves to high standards to earn and preserve trust and respect from the audiences they serve. Lapses in judgment affect the staff as well as the credibility of the media they produce. Students should realize that discipline problems or poor choices extend beyond individual consequences.
Staff manual process
Editors should develop guidelines for staff behavior as part of the staff application. Staff members should be required to sign a staff contract to demonstrate their understanding of and commitment to expected student conduct. The contract should specify consequences and/or conditions for removal from staff. Similarly, students should study professional codes of ethics and may consider creating their own.
Suggestions
• All school rules should apply. Staffs should not condone or tolerate drug or alcohol use. Editors should work with the adviser to determine a policy for how to handle infractions in conjunction with or in addition to school-mandated punishment. For example, if a staff member is suspended from school for a drug-related offense, how does this affect the student’s participation on staff?
• If students cannot be trusted in other classes or programs on campus, their work as journalists also will be questioned. Cheating and/or academic dishonesty should not be tolerated. The staff manual and contract should specify consequences for plagiarism, fabrication and other offenses. This may include earning zero credit and being suspended or removed from staff.
• If staff members are unsupervised or have access on campus to areas generally considered off-limits to students, they should conduct themselves in a professional manner. Students should not go places on campus that are not open or accessible to them. It would be unethical to report on events or circumstances that occur in areas where students have gained unauthorized access, although it may lead to discussion or research for future reporting conducted under authorized access.
• Press credentials are intended only for staff members. Students should use their press passes for reporting purposes only and not to gain free admission for personal reasons. Students should not allow unauthorized use of their press passes or provide non-staff access to friends or family members. When students are wearing or using media credentials, their focus should be on reporting for student media and representing the news outlet. During that time, students are not fans, spectators or audience members in the traditional sense; staff members should be aware they are visible and accountable for how they represent themselves and should maintain a professional, objective manner. Similarly, it would be unethical for student journalists to conceal their press credentials or to attend an event in an official reporting capacity without making their intentions known.
• Reporting on a club, event, or team in which students are directly involved is a conflict of interest; even if reporters strive to remain neutral and report objectively, it is unfair to readers. Staff members may lead each other to story ideas or help connect sources, but they should not write about stories to which they are connected.
• Receiving compensation from sources is not ethical. Students should not receive perks or free items such as meals, tickets or merchandise in exchange for writing a news or feature story to promote a group, product or service. If students choose to write a review, their work should be unbiased and should specify if any aspect of the experience was provided free based on their role as student journalists.
• Students should exhibit professionalism at outside events.
• Regular attendance in class and at required staff functions is part of the student media experience. Students who have frequent absences from class create complications for staff production. The staff manual and contract should specify expectations for attending work sessions and any other required functions so students are able to plan their schedules accordingly. Editors should work with the adviser to determine what level of participation is reasonable from all staff members and what, if any, time outside class may be necessary or required. The policy and contract should take into consideration factors such as transportation, health challenges, extracurricular activities and employment in order to achieve a win-win for students to make an informed decision about their participation on a student media staff. The policy and contract also should specify circumstances under which absences or failure to attend expected staff commitments could lead to removal. Students might consider having parents sign the contract as well to show their understanding of their son’s or daughter’s obligations.
• Meeting deadlines is essential to staff success. Students should work with the adviser to determine what course of action to take in the event of missed deadlines, which may include no credit, reduced credit, loss of privileges and/or removal from staff.
• Students should treat other staff members with respect and should work to resolve any conflicts peacefully and respectfully without involving other students. Editors may choose to create a specific conflict resolution policy to serve as neutral mediators when needed. Conflicts from within the program spreading beyond the newsroom hurt the program’s reputation.
• Bullying of any type should not be tolerated.
• Students should strive to maintain a calm and professional demeanor even in situations that may rise to heated or confrontational levels. Especially when reporting in an official capacity at a community event, school board meeting, protest or rally, reporters should not take an adversarial role or become part of the story.
• The following scenarios might be cause for removal or discipline from student media: misuse of school or media program equipment, failure to meet deadlines, plagiarism or fabrication, drug or alcohol use, stealing and inappropriate behavior on a school trip.
Resources
Guidelines for Avoiding Conflict of Interest, Radio Television Digital News Association
NPR Ethics Handbook/Independence/Conflict of Interest, National Public Radio
Why Transparency Is Not Enough: The Case of Mr. Mike, National Public Radio
Journalists face conflicts of interest too, Society of Professional Journalists
Avoiding conflicts of interest as a student journalist, Scripps Media
Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics, Society of Professional Journalists
Model Code of Ethics for High School Journalists, National Scholastic Press Association
National Press Photographers Association Code of Ethics
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Read MoreAcademic dishonesty
Ethical guidelines
Students should be honest in all stages of their work. Dishonesty is a serious offense and should not be tolerated.
Dishonesty compromises the integrity and credibility of the student publication. The editorial board and/or adviser should address any instance of academic misconduct immediately.
Staff manual process
Student editors should develop a clear process for handling academic dishonesty. Both media staff and school policies may dictate consequences for academic dishonesty. In addition to school consequences, other approaches could include removal or suspension from the media staff and publishing an apology.
Suggestions
In journalism, academic dishonesty is not limited to cheating and plagiarism. Issues especially relevant to student media include:
• Fabrication — inventing quotes or other content
• Non-contextual content — taking quotes, facts or other content out of their intended context in a way that misleads the audience
• Manipulation of photos, video and text — editing or altering content in a way to change its meaning or misrepresent reality
Resources
The Fundamental Values of Academic Integrity, The Center for Academic Integrity
Journalism Department Code of Ethics and Conduct, San Francisco State University
The Medill Justice Project Ethics Book, Northwestern University
Our cheating culture: Plagiarism and fabrication are unacceptable in journalism, The Buttry Diary
Audio: Plagiarism, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee, Press Rights Minute
National Press Photographers Code of Ethics
Audio: Creative Commons Licensing, JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee, Press Rights Minute
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Read MoreOwnership of student content
Ethical guidelines
Absent a written agreement indicating otherwise, student journalists own the copyright to the works they create. Each media outlet should ensure it has clear policies in place for staff members and the publication that spell out ownership and the right of the publication to use student work.
Staff manual process
Several options exist for written policy statements. The student media outlet can allow students to retain ownership of the works they create while giving the publication a license to use them. The downside of this option is that the publication may not be able to prevent others from using the work without permission because it is not technically an owner of the work. The second option assigns the copyright ownership of the students’ works to the publication, which can defend those ownership rights.
Suggestions
• Student editors should discuss which option makes them feel the most comfortable.
• Student media staffs should use suggested guidelines from the Journalism Education Association Scholastic Press Rights Committee and the Student Press Law Center to craft an ownership statement suitable for their program.
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
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Read MorePolicy sets standards and staff manuals
ethically carry them out
by 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.
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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.
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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.
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.