Why, then, do student journalists get so upset when their school newspapers are excised, censored or suspended by school principals and superintendents?
High school students don't pay adviser salaries and printing costs or own the equipment and working space. Taxpayers do.
The U.S. Supreme Court in 1988 found that First Amendment rights of students can be abridged if their speech does not meet the basic mission of their school. Missions are determined by school boards, not students.
Identical circumstances exist in the real world of journalism.
Owners of publishing and broadcast mediums--represented by publishers, executive editors, managers--have policies, attitudes and slants (often unwritten) that reporters and editors must follow.
Reporters and editors are free to seek other employment if they can't accept editorial or management policies. It happens every day. And no professional journalist in that situation would ever claim his First Amendment rights were violated.
Students ought to be taught this in Journalism 101:
Voters elect school board members (the board of directors), who appoint a superintendent (publisher). The superintendent appoints a school principal (executive editor), who appoints a teacher as newspaper adviser (managing editor).
The adviser oversees students (editors, reporters, photographers, etc.) who actually gather and prepare the copy, graphics and photos for publication. Just as in the private sector, direction and policy flows from the top down--not vice versa.
Stop teaching student journalists that they--not their employers or benefactors--have the final say in what is published or broadcast. (6 FEBRUARY 2000).
