MARYLAND -- Nearly 4,000 copies of the University of Maryland's student newspaper, The Diamondback, were stolen early Wednesday morning from four campus distribution points.
The university police department is investigating the theft and the culprits could face stiff punishment if caught.
MISSOURI -- The Clayton School District board of education last week reviewed a student publications policy that supports student freedom of expression on a level that is almost unrivalled nationally.
"The Board of Education encourages student production and distribution of official school-sponsored publications that can provide opportunities for practical journalistic expression for the written expression of differing opinions, and for the creation of a forum for the expression of opinions among the school district community on issues of importance to students and staff," the policy reads.
"Because Clayton High School student journalists historically have exercised their powers and skills in a responsible, respectful and appropriate manner, the board encourages the administration to allow its student journalists to function with minimal oversight consistent with the trust and respect that its student journalists have earned," according to the policy.
OHIO -- A county court has dismissed parts of a Kent State University student's invasion of privacy lawsuit, including the naming of the student newspaper and several of its staff members as defendants.
D'Andra Mull was running for executive director of the student senate in spring 2001 when the Daily Kent Stater received a tip that she had misrepresented her grade point average in a story the paper did on the candidates.
NORTH DAKOTA -- A physics professor at the University of North Dakota won a libel lawsuit against a former student on April 2 when a jury ordered that the defendant pay the professor $3 million.
John Wagner filed the lawsuit earlier this year after one of his former students, religious studies major Glenda Miskin, posted an article titled "Kinky, Torrid Romance by Randy Physics Professor" on undnews.com, a Web site she operates.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Former Supreme Court Justice Byron White, author of the student-press case Hazelwood School District v.
MINNESOTA -- Student journalists at The Minnesota Daily covering riots following the University of Minnesota's national hockey championship went from covering the news to becoming the news last weekend.
The trend of newspaper thefts does not appear to be coming to a close any time soon. Eleven campuses have been hit in the spring semester, bringing the total to 23 for this academic year, as reported to the Student Press Law Center.
At the University of North Florida, about 80 percent of The Spinnaker's press run was stolen last week.
MICHIGAN -- Student journalists at Utica High School are fuming after their principal censored their award-winning school newspaper's coverage of a highly publicized pending lawsuit involving allegations that the school district's bus depot causes health problems for area residents.
Principal Richard Machesky forced the Arrow staff to remove a front-page story written for the March 15 issue of the paper about a lawsuit the school faces from a resident claiming school bus exhaust fumes caused his lung cancer.
FLORIDA -- A nearly three-month-long saga involving the yearbook at Florida A&M University has apparently come to an end.
OKLAHOMA -- Trials involving student athletes are definitely newsworthy. But at the University of Central Oklahoma, someone deemed the coverage of one such case too scandalous, stealing several thousand copies of the student newspaper.
The Vista estimated that nearly 4,000 copies of its 5,000-copy press run were stolen March 14 from approximately 25 distribution bins.