Timber!
Building off of John’s previous post, tattoos continue to be the scourge of Wentzville, Mo.
Yesterday, after receiving approval from principal and The Wolf’s Howl had been distributed during fifth hour, administrators of the Wentzville School District pulled the paper from circulation.
The offending item this time was again, a tattoo. On a spread about cancer – sorry for the lack of details – there was evidently a photo of a cancer patient who had a small tattoo.The horror … the horror.
It appears that the administrators in Wentzville are attempting to give their counterparts at Stevenson High School a run for their money in the most ridiculous reason to censor a paper contest.
These two schools continue to distinguish themselves in ways that are unfortunately getting a lot of recognition. Stevenson, as it was pointed out by JEA president Jack Kennedy in a letter to the Stevenson administrators, is a nationally recognized model school. Unfortunately in these cases, Stevenson is becoming the model of what not to do when it comes to supporting students, the First Amendment or the educational process. Let’s hope that other administrators and school districts are not paying attention to what these districts are doing, because it could be the start of a very small snowball that is rolling down the hill … its momentum needs to be stopped before this becomes a much bigger problem.
Read MoreThe best things to teach them
My Teaching High School Journalism course at Kent State is almost over for this semester, and I’m beginning to wonder if I have taught the right things to these education majors who may end up in media classrooms.
Sure, as usual I started with law, emphasizing unprotected speech and the stuff that can REALLY get student media in trouble. They learned about Tinker, Hazelwood, Bethel and Bong Hits and the impact these cases have. From there, we worked our way through ethical issues — the “SHOULD we?” that follows the “COULD we?” After all, without 70 percent on the law and ethics test, my students don’t pass the course. That stuff matters.
They figured out the difference between journalistic writing and “English-class writing,” and we practiced coaching and the maestro concept as we thought about how to package stories for an audience using good design and graphics. Yes, I tried to teach them everything I learned while earning my undergraduate and graduate degrees in journalism education and from MANY years in the classroom.
But did I teach them to show their students the importance of caring? The need to cover stories that should be told, not just the ones that fall into their laps? Did I make sure they won’t be afraid to tell their students they have the right and even obligation to question authority? Did I make sure they know it’s not just a matter of filling the time on air or the space on a page? Did I teach them to help those in their classes stand up for their beliefs?
Will those in my course this semester become the kind of teachers who can support their student journalists and help them make a difference?
I’ll have a new group next semester. What do YOU think I should teach them? It’s only 15 weeks of class, but what MUST be part of their learning?
Candace Perkins Bowen, MJE
Read MoreYour responses essential to clarification of student press freedoms
One way or another, no matter where censorship of scholastic media is reported, we need you to respond to comments.
All one has to do is to read the comment sections of of the Daily Herald and the Chicago Tribune, among others, to see the lack of understanding about the First Amendment and how it applies – or should apply – to scholastic media.
All it takes is 10 minutes. You know the principles and the educational validity of student free expression and decision-making.
Your colleagues facing censorship, their students and the parents of the community need to know there are others who abhor censorship.
After all, freedom of student expression is what are are passionate about, something we believe in. Something we want to see continue.
Let those who don’t seem to believe in these principles hear from you today – and all the tomorrows it takes.
Read MoreDC: Truly inspiring
After the past couple of months of news on this blog, it would be easy to be despondent.
Student work being censored for laughable reasons. Advisers having their authority usurped. Creativity being stifled.
As it always does, the JEA/NSPA national convention, has energized me. Sitting in the SPRC panel on Saturday, we had the good fortune to meet with a courageous group of students who are undergoing censorship, but who are seeking out the information and ammunition to fight these attempts to deprive them of their rights.
They came armed with information and questions, with emotion and with resolve. I’m hopeful the students who showed up and sought knowledge from those of us assembled were happy with what was provided. I also hope they continue to stay in touch with the SPRC and let us help them in their struggles.
Seeing Henry Rome and Seth Zweifler, from Conestoga, Pa., win award after award for their work administrators sought to quash was similarly energizing. As was hearing Al Leonard, a principal who gets it, speak to those assembled at the panel and hopefully provide the assembled students with hope that there are some principals who seek to nurture the First Amendment rather than strangle it.
It’s not easy to stand up to an administrator as a teacher. It’s tough to imagine what it’s like as a teenage journalist. Administrators are pretty well counting on the fact that students will not be aware of their rights and will cede to their authority.
But it fills me with hope for the cause this blog is here to promote – scholastic press rights – that these brave students are so willing and passionate to stand up and fight for what is right.
It’s time to stand up
So with all of this recent hubbub surrounding President Obama’s speech about education, I’ve come to a conclusion: it has never been more important for teachers, journalism teachers in particular, to be adamant in making sure their voices are heard alongside and in opposition to those calling for speeches like the President – any President – made yesterday to be taboo in our classrooms.
In fact, if we don’t push back at this with just as much furor and vigor as those parents do, I’d say it is tantamount to an abdication of our First Amendment rights. In my classroom, I teach the First Amendment and sing its glories as often as I can. If I fail to tell my administrators my beliefs as a teacher about what has happened and fail to push back against these type of crusades, then am I not failing my students as a role model, as someone who is a vigorous protector of First Amendment rights?
Since the day our guidelines for dealing with the President’s speech came out, I’ve been incensed, and it is not because of my political leanings. It is because I am a teacher. I was hired to teach the curriculum of my courses because I have the proper certification and experience and because I am a professional. That means I have been entrusted with taking the district approved curriculum and teaching it to the best of my abilities and how it best suits me and my students. While I am happy to have input from parents about their child’s education, it is my belief as an educator, I am well-suited to determine whether or not a speech by the President of the country in which their child lives in is appropriate material for my classroom.
As teachers who run publications grounded in the First Amendment, we have all dealt with someone who has been unhappy with something the newspaper, website or yearbook has published, or that the podcast, news show or radio station has broadcast. We have heard opposing viewpoints from all sides of an issue and it makes our publications stronger for this feedback.
I’m happy to know the parents of students in my district are aware of what’s going on and feel so moved to contact our administrators and voice their opinions. Debate and dissent are essential to the functioning of a democracy. However, I’m well beyond dismayed that our administrators are so lacking in backbone when it comes to standing up to the slightest whiff of criticism. Criticism is the crucible that makes our schools better. As the President said on Tuesday, “Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures.”
Our nation’s best schools will be the ones who stand up and try new things and let their teachers, administrators, students and parents discover, together with input from the whole community, what works best, not just the voices of an overly motivated and loud few.
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