By Stetson Miller, Jenna Spoont, Brittany Roker and Abby Pioch.
Students recite the First Amendment, and Stetson Miller speaks about its importance to student journalists.
First Amendment video
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Friday, February 11, 2011
Op/ed: Press rights here & abroad
By Allison Kozeracki
The right to write, at home and abroad
In recent months, WikiLeaks has garnered worldwide attention for making classified government documents available to the public. While WikiLeaks has received praise along with criticism, the controversy brought to question the people’s right to information and the role the media plays in delivering it to them.
Naturally, freedoms of speech and of the press vary by country. For this reason, Reporters Without Borders (RWB) annually compiles and publishes a worldwide Press Freedom Index. RWB, an international organization that advocates freedom of the press, assesses attacks on journalists and other forms of pressure against the free press. Using the information, RWB is able to rank countries from the least press freedom (highest scores) to the most press freedom (lowest scores).
Out of 178 countries, the one ranked at the very bottom of the 2010 index is Eritrea. With a score of 150,000, Eritrea is the only African country without any privately owned news media. In 2001, the government closed the private press for “endangering national security” and arrested several journalists for publishing unfavorable views of National Assembly members.
With strict censorship and persecution of journalists, North Korea, Turkmenistan, Iran, Burma and Syria, are not far behind on the list. Hundreds of murders of Russian journalists remain unsolved.
Although the People’s Republic of China has loosened its restrictions on the media since the rule of Chairman Mao, it still keeps journalists on a tight leash. Chinese journalists are to complete six-month training courses to learn to “eradicate false news, improve the feeling of social responsibility and reinforce journalistic ethics.” The imprisonment of human rights activist Liu Xiabo has also tarnished China’s image. China was ranked 171st on the Press Freedom Index. At the other end of the spectrum, Northern European countries consistently rank at the top of the index. This year, Finland, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland are tied for first. These countries have all made efforts to respect journalists and protect them from judicial abuse.
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits Congress from passing any law abridging the freedom of the press. While it cannot guarantee the same rights to journalists in other countries, it’s up to all American student journalists to make sure their rights are being fully protected.
To see the complete Press Freedom Index, visit www.rsf.org.
Op/ed about the importance of the First Amendment
By Lavi Ben-Dor
You’ve got rights, too!
As Scholastic Journalism Week approached, I found myself thinking more and more about that law that we hold so dearly—the First Amendment. Although the language is tedious, it states, among other things, that all of us have the right to say what we want to say…and write what we want to write. That includes you, me, and every other student (as well as adults) in the nation.
Although these two laws have been challenged often, as courts are forced to further define them, all of us should appreciate the freedom they give us.
I recently heard about the book “Hero Type” by Barry Lyga. The book’s central character, Kevin Ross, becomes a hero overnight when he saves one of his peers from a serial killer. However, his popularity plummets—when he is caught taking “Support Our Troops” magnets off his car. He then launches a campaign to argue in defense of the freedom of speech, challenging others and the reader to consider why we say the Pledge of Allegiance or pin “Support the Troops” stickers to our lockers, backpacks, or cars.
Although many of us have been fortunate to avoid such an uproar, the book teaches us an important lesson—we have the right to express our beliefs as we wish, even if it means not wearing a pro-army pin even though we are patriots. And it made us think and realize that free speech is not something we can dismiss lightly.
The current protests in Egypt
Another prominent issue on the table is the extremely controversial WikiLeaks, bringing up a bucket load of moral, ethical, and journalistic dilemmas: Should the group continue releasing information? Should we have the right to see government cables? And what does this reveal about the American government? This shows us that the U.S.
Students can also learn much from the Tinker v. Des Moines School District case. In 1969, the parents of two students, who wore black armbands in support of ending the Vietnam War but were suspended after refusing to take them off, sued the district and won. This monumental case established the fact that students still have their constitutional rights, even the freedom of expression, at school, and do not “leave their rights at the schoolhouse door.”
All of us can celebrate the First Amendment and all it gives us, even if we’re not student journalists or even slightly interested in newspapers. Because after all, all students the right to speak and write down their thoughts, opinions, and beliefs. Even you.
Student journalists under the law
By Neel Thakur
Guidelines for student journalists PDF on Google Docs
Guidelines for student journalists PDF on Google Docs
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