Reaction to Frank LoMonte's address from Katie Wright, English II / Journalism Teacher, Crete High School:
I walked away from the address by Frank LoMonte, Executive Director of the Student Press Law Center , with many questions. Not questions that he left unanswered, but questions that I (and all of us as Nebraskans, for that matter) need to consider.
Questions like Do Nebraska school administrators understand the democratic value of what journalism can do and create in a high school climate ? And Do these administrators understand why or how censorship decisions are so costly on the value students place upon the content learned and created in a high school journalism classroom ?
Think about the ownership students place on their publication and how that ownership is affected when their ability to write about issues that matter is limited by school administrators.
In regards to my knowledge of the true cost of the Tinker and Hazelwood decisions and their effects upon the scholastic journalist, I was also left with a better understanding through one thought posed: when it comes to the “special characteristics of the school environment,” as quoted in the Tinker decision, the thought from LoMonte that those special characteristics call for students being allowed more favor and leniency, not less (as has been enacted by school administrators, school boards, and, eventually, the courts) is interesting when that notion is considered as sound pedagogical practice in reference toward civic practice. Just as we provide practice fields for every extra curricular under the sun in today's day and age with the dozens of sports and activities offered to high school students, why are we not allowing those students the practice field of journalism to hone the art of using their first amendment rights in a safe, moderated, supervised arena? Yet another good question.
According to LoMonte, as a result of this lack of proper practice in respect toward first amendment rights use, we're being told that many college and universities are finding themselves having to institute “remedial first amendment rights classes” for their freshmen to aide students in gaining better civics education bases. This leads one to question whether or not the American high school is creating products which can be considered ‘college ready'. If not, those are lasting damages that colleges are finding themselves forced to undo. And who is to blame? Teachers? Administrators? School Boards? Legislators? The Courts?
I liken it to an analogy of handing over driving privileges at the age of 16 to an inexperienced and untrained driver. States are imposing more legislation to limit adolescent driving privileges pointing toward the cost of the damage these drivers can do. They think the same can be done by not providing legislation to protect these same students' rights to learn the skill of using their first amendment right in a controlled, educational environment? By limiting their ability to practice those skills, how will they be prepared to use those skills in the future? Who will become the press of our future? Who will become the democratic leaders? Who will vote in those leaders?
So we are brought to the point where we must stop looking at the student free expression law not as though it's for the student journalists, but as if it is for the good of the public democracy in general, which was the main point of LoMonte's message.
As it is now, we have the highest percentage of embedded journalists in an environment that is the most under covered aspect in our states. According to LoMonte as he pointed to a recent research study coming out of the University of Missouri , 1.4% of coverage in the mainstream media is devoted to education, but it is consistently the highest percentage of state budgets. Why is this? There is an opaque handling of school matters that isn't being covered by mainstream media. This current environment is beckoning for student journalists to be trained to ensure a clearer transparency, to train watchdogs, to help students demonstrate a level of civic readiness to maintain a high functioning democracy. To hold school districts accountable from the ground up. Freedom of Speech and the student press is that regard isn't only in the students' best interest, but in the school districts' best interests, as well and the more we get district patrons to realize that, the more of a backing we're going to have on the legislative level. The students' discussion of these timely and meaningful topics needs to take place in the controlled venue of a classroom, not online as it is doing far too often now.
So what program is in place in schools that already trains students to continually check and recheck facts, not publish rumors, place ownership on written work and retract mistakes that don't reflect the truth? What other program provides these skills to help combat the problems that cyber bullying and social networking sites have created, that nonpartisan governments, greedy politicians and layer upon layer of opaque bureaucracy create? None other than journalism, as LoMonte pointed out.
I fully agree that without legislation like the Student Free Expression Bill (LB898), policies like Hazelwood will only continue to afford the least amount of freedom the law allows. It's not only an abysmal policy to which too many schools adhere, it is unsound educational practice and a horrible preparation plan which will fail to produce civically-minded, college-ready students. If schools can have trained teachers who can enact policies to get their students better rights, all the better. But our state isn't providing protection for those teachers to be able to enact those policies without fear of losing their jobs at this point. So what is our ultimate goal? To protect the students? To protect the teachers? To protect administrators who support the district or administrators who protect their students' rights? Or to protect the school districts? Once again, there's little in the form of meaningful answers.
As LoMonte stated, students will not all be journalists when they grow up, it's true; but they will all be Americans . To be successful in our approach, LoMonte's suggestion is that to save journalism in our schools, we must approach it as saving civics education . Doing so, we must not allow our administrators to continue to ‘dumb down' journalism curriculums by requiring students to continually write ‘fluff' stories. Stories that no one reads. Stories that don't matter. Stories that the kids themselves don't care about because no one else does, either.
We need to smarten our readerships to demand better reporting and ask questions of the administration when that doesn't take place. Instead of our readerships being surprised that we jumped a story that the local paper didn't cover first, they should expect that out of student journalists because, after all, they have the freshest ideas. That is, unless they haven't given up on reporting them already because they're continually told they can't.
So after the presentation and roundtable discussion, I'm ready to roll up my sleeves. Yes, it's going to take some work, guts and courage. But with the correct guidance and direction, I think we can get this done.
Questions like Do Nebraska school administrators understand the democratic value of what journalism can do and create in a high school climate ? And Do these administrators understand why or how censorship decisions are so costly on the value students place upon the content learned and created in a high school journalism classroom ?
Think about the ownership students place on their publication and how that ownership is affected when their ability to write about issues that matter is limited by school administrators.
In regards to my knowledge of the true cost of the Tinker and Hazelwood decisions and their effects upon the scholastic journalist, I was also left with a better understanding through one thought posed: when it comes to the “special characteristics of the school environment,” as quoted in the Tinker decision, the thought from LoMonte that those special characteristics call for students being allowed more favor and leniency, not less (as has been enacted by school administrators, school boards, and, eventually, the courts) is interesting when that notion is considered as sound pedagogical practice in reference toward civic practice. Just as we provide practice fields for every extra curricular under the sun in today's day and age with the dozens of sports and activities offered to high school students, why are we not allowing those students the practice field of journalism to hone the art of using their first amendment rights in a safe, moderated, supervised arena? Yet another good question.
According to LoMonte, as a result of this lack of proper practice in respect toward first amendment rights use, we're being told that many college and universities are finding themselves having to institute “remedial first amendment rights classes” for their freshmen to aide students in gaining better civics education bases. This leads one to question whether or not the American high school is creating products which can be considered ‘college ready'. If not, those are lasting damages that colleges are finding themselves forced to undo. And who is to blame? Teachers? Administrators? School Boards? Legislators? The Courts?
I liken it to an analogy of handing over driving privileges at the age of 16 to an inexperienced and untrained driver. States are imposing more legislation to limit adolescent driving privileges pointing toward the cost of the damage these drivers can do. They think the same can be done by not providing legislation to protect these same students' rights to learn the skill of using their first amendment right in a controlled, educational environment? By limiting their ability to practice those skills, how will they be prepared to use those skills in the future? Who will become the press of our future? Who will become the democratic leaders? Who will vote in those leaders?
So we are brought to the point where we must stop looking at the student free expression law not as though it's for the student journalists, but as if it is for the good of the public democracy in general, which was the main point of LoMonte's message.
As it is now, we have the highest percentage of embedded journalists in an environment that is the most under covered aspect in our states. According to LoMonte as he pointed to a recent research study coming out of the University of Missouri , 1.4% of coverage in the mainstream media is devoted to education, but it is consistently the highest percentage of state budgets. Why is this? There is an opaque handling of school matters that isn't being covered by mainstream media. This current environment is beckoning for student journalists to be trained to ensure a clearer transparency, to train watchdogs, to help students demonstrate a level of civic readiness to maintain a high functioning democracy. To hold school districts accountable from the ground up. Freedom of Speech and the student press is that regard isn't only in the students' best interest, but in the school districts' best interests, as well and the more we get district patrons to realize that, the more of a backing we're going to have on the legislative level. The students' discussion of these timely and meaningful topics needs to take place in the controlled venue of a classroom, not online as it is doing far too often now.
So what program is in place in schools that already trains students to continually check and recheck facts, not publish rumors, place ownership on written work and retract mistakes that don't reflect the truth? What other program provides these skills to help combat the problems that cyber bullying and social networking sites have created, that nonpartisan governments, greedy politicians and layer upon layer of opaque bureaucracy create? None other than journalism, as LoMonte pointed out.
I fully agree that without legislation like the Student Free Expression Bill (LB898), policies like Hazelwood will only continue to afford the least amount of freedom the law allows. It's not only an abysmal policy to which too many schools adhere, it is unsound educational practice and a horrible preparation plan which will fail to produce civically-minded, college-ready students. If schools can have trained teachers who can enact policies to get their students better rights, all the better. But our state isn't providing protection for those teachers to be able to enact those policies without fear of losing their jobs at this point. So what is our ultimate goal? To protect the students? To protect the teachers? To protect administrators who support the district or administrators who protect their students' rights? Or to protect the school districts? Once again, there's little in the form of meaningful answers.
As LoMonte stated, students will not all be journalists when they grow up, it's true; but they will all be Americans . To be successful in our approach, LoMonte's suggestion is that to save journalism in our schools, we must approach it as saving civics education . Doing so, we must not allow our administrators to continue to ‘dumb down' journalism curriculums by requiring students to continually write ‘fluff' stories. Stories that no one reads. Stories that don't matter. Stories that the kids themselves don't care about because no one else does, either.
We need to smarten our readerships to demand better reporting and ask questions of the administration when that doesn't take place. Instead of our readerships being surprised that we jumped a story that the local paper didn't cover first, they should expect that out of student journalists because, after all, they have the freshest ideas. That is, unless they haven't given up on reporting them already because they're continually told they can't.
So after the presentation and roundtable discussion, I'm ready to roll up my sleeves. Yes, it's going to take some work, guts and courage. But with the correct guidance and direction, I think we can get this done.
