High school newspaper halts publication in protest of prior review

by Scott Wylie Hoover


Staff members of a Minnesota town high school were halted of publication their school paper until prior review is lifted from the school district. The Viewer, was stopped for prior review after the paper reported a story naming two student who were formally disciplined after posting a “joke” picture of their teacher on Facebook.
The reporter interviewed the principle of the school for the story. However, she did not see the article until it was published and ready for distributing. The principle contacted the advisor about pulling the story but the paper had been sent for publication.
The reason the principle wanted the story pulled was due to concerns about releasing the student’s names and private disciplinary information without parental consent. In order for the students to distribute the paper before the end of the day they had to obtain permission from the parents, which they did. However, the administration is still upholding their standard of prior review of future newspapers.

First things first: posting pictures on pictures of your teachers on Facebook, in any form, is a no-go. Schools have wired, and unclear, policies regarding social networking cites, so just to be safe, don’t do it.
Referring to the article, it is a shame that the administration had to step in and distract the distribution of the paper. However they did claim the article was in violation of Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).
Student Press Law Center from Minnesota attorney Steve Aggregaard at Bassford Remele, P.A. said it was it makes no legal or logical sense to equate a newspaper to an educational record.
“doing that would be a chilling effect on college and high school newspapers nationwide at public schools and that certainly is not what Congress intended by enacting FERPA," Aggregaard said.
It isn’t that fact the paper review this issue, and possibly had a “legitimate” excuse too. It is, that because of this one incident, they want to review all future distributions of the publication. Review is one item, censorship is the other.