Thank you for our rights

By Elizabeth Munroe
Editor in Chief, the North Star

At Bloomington North, we are incredibly fortunate to have an administration that understands and honors the rights of free press guaranteed by the First Amendment. Our administrators have never tried to subject our publications to prior review nor do they have any plans to do so. Similarly, our adviser steps back and allows the publications to be truly student-run, with the student editors, including myself, making all decisions about content. In fact, our adviser refuses to do anything but give suggestions and only does that upon request.

In this way, student journalists at North are guaranteed the same freedoms of the press offered to professional journalists. This approach provides for an excellent opportunity to grow and learn. Without such an opportunity, I do not believe our paper would have won the Hoosier Star award last year, an award given to the top five high school newspapers in Indiana. Similarly, without such freedoms, our staff members would not win as many Harvey Awards from the Indiana High School Press Association, naming them some of the top writers, photographers and designers in the state.

It is these freedoms that allow students to learn how to practice responsible, ethical journalism. Because the responsibility for the content of the newspaper is ours, we take care in what we choose to publish. When we publish something possibly controversial, we make sure we have good reasons to do so and strong evidence behind the story. For example, in October, we published a story, complete with photos (although not showing faces), about the “dirty dancing” at our school’s Homecoming. The article examined the rules of school dances and the role of chaperones. Many people were upset by the article’s criticism of the Homecoming dance and the photos, but we believed it was an issue that needed to be addressed. We responsibly, however, published all six letters to the editor, even though there were none in support of our decision to publish the article. Had our administration or adviser banned us from publishing this story, the issue of inappropriate dancing would have remained unaddressed. With such constrictions, our paper would not have served one of its most important purposes: acting as a public forum for our school. Not only this, but the student journalists involved in writing and publishing the story would not have learned how to responsibly handle controversy and criticism.

The staff of North publications are sincerely thankful for the guarantees of free press granted to them by our school administrators and adviser. Many schools in the state and the country are not as lucky, so we are truly thankful.