The Student Press Law Center, in its May 4 blog, put JEA’s newly adopted definitions of prior review and prior restraint into legal and educational perspective.

“If a school official insists on reading a student publication ahead of time, they will eventually try to censor it,” SPLC consultant Mike Hiestand wrote. “I would like someone to prove me wrong on this, but I’ve never seen an established system of prior review that has ever remained a pure “reading only” practice.”

In its newly adopted guidelines, JEA created the following definitions:

• Prior review occurs when anyone not on the publication/media staff requires that he or she be allowed to read, view or approve student material before distribution, airing or publication.

• Prior restraint occurs when someone not on the publication/media staff requires pre-distribution changes to or removal of student media content.

“In the real world …” Hiestand wrote, “experienced, trained advisers that work closely with their students, offering suggestions for improvement — often after reading the content ahead of time — can be a valuable and welcome resource, something the JEA recognizes in excluding such ‘advising’ from its definition of prior review. But even advisers, the definitions recognize, can go too far, and ‘when an adviser requires pre-distribution changes over the objections of student editors,’ the definition states, ‘his/her actions then become prior restraint.’”

Check jeasprc.org soon for recommendations on how advisers can assist students without making decisions for them or requiring them to make changes they don’t want to make.

On this Thanksgiving Day, I am thankful for how student journalism programs across this country prepare their graduates for real life. Districts cutting their journalism programs need to hear this story.

This week I was visited by two former student editors. As a journalism adviser I know about the study “Journalism Kids Do Better” and often hear about how successful those high school j students are in college. I hear every year from former students who are excelling in college.

This week I was reminded of something much more. Neither of these former students were able to attend college out of high school, but both of them credited their study of journalism in high school with having helped them secure good jobs in a tough economy.

Student #1 was a photo editor and after graduation applied at a new Target store going up in the area. She interviewed to be a cashier. Not only did she get a job (she says because of the communication skills she learned from interviewing numerous people), she was actually put in charge of the new photo lab and setting up the entire operation. She subsequently moved on to set up other stores around the state. She has now changed careers and is a corrections officer, but she credits those same communications skills with her successful interactions with her employer, her coworkers and the inmates.

Student #2 could not continue her education because she had a baby just a year out of high school. She too credits her communications skills with landing her current job. She is an animal research assistant for a major medical company and, because of her journalism experience, is now the editor of their division newsletter. She shared that getting to tell her bosses they need to get their articles in and meet deadlines is a highlight of the job.

The skill to get a decent paying job without a college diploma and job security – that’s what the journalism program gave these students – and in this economy that is truly a reason to be thankful.

We know there are a significant number of open forum student media out there, and we’d like to see you apply for JEA’s First Amendment Press Freedom Award (FAPFA).

Being an open forum for student expression, besides having exceptional educational validity and offering excellent learning opportunities for students, also can help protect a school system in cases of liability.

If you think your student media are forums, by policy or practice, then go here and download the application form for FAPFA. Application for the honor comes in two parts: the initial application of 25 questions for a media adviser and an administrator. Those meeting the criteria for the award will then receive a second application to be filled out by the principal, all student media editors and advisers. Deadline for applying is Dec. 1, 2009. Those meeting the final criteria will be recognized at the JEA/NSPA convention in Portland.

Good luck!

We continue to raise  the question, borrowed partially from a recent ethics workshop at Kent State University: What Values?

What value is there in prior review by anyone outside the student media staff? Even if administrators can claim some sort of legal allowance stating they can, what are the ethical and educational  values indicating they should? Who gains? Who is harmed? What elements of the school mission are fulfilled? How does the action serve truth and accuracy?

Along this line is a relatively new upshot on prior review (maybe not new, but certainly new to this timeframe): The superintendent as publisher; the principal as editor and the adviser as assistant adviser.

The students: certainly not getting a journalism education.

We would again ask: What is the educational value? How does this address the greater good? Who benefits? Who is harmed? What are students learning about the values of a school system that removes them from the process of critical thinking and decision making –  and also puts their teacher and principal in legal harm’s way?

What values – educational or otherwise – are at play?

Speaking of What Values, those teachers interested in lesson plans to address journalism ethics and discussions on online ethics have a free source.

The plans are available for high schools to supplement Kent State-Poynter What Values? workshop Sept. 17. Download materials at the workshop site by scrolling down to the lesson plan button. You can also follow the discussions on online journalism ethics from the workshop.