A Louisiana high school student has dropped an off-campus free speech lawsuit against his school after officials agreed to expunge records of the discipline he received.The unnamed student at Brusly High School in West Baton Rouge received a two-day, in-school suspension after administrators discovered a Facebook post in which he insulted a teacher.
Tag: Off-campus Student Internet Speech
MySpace, F-bombs mark important week for student expression at the Supreme Court
Student expression advocates have their eyes on the Supreme Court this week, with two major First Amendment issues on the agenda.The Court will hear arguments Tuesday in what could be a landmark case in the law of broadcasting.
School attorneys working hard to tip the balance against students like Emma Sullivan
A high school student makes a coarse remark about a prominent politician on Twitter.The post comes to the attention of her principal, who gives her a stern lecture about civility but recognizes that his authority goes no further, and that any punishment must come from the student’s parents.This is a delicately balanced system of freedom versus authority at work – and in the case of tweeting Kansas teen Emma Sullivan, the system did work.Emma received a chewing-out for her unkind (but constitutionally protected) message about Kansas Gov.
Supreme Court shows interest in case of student disciplined for off-campus MySpace group
The Supreme Court appears to be showing initial interest in Kowalski v. Berkeley County Schools, one of a slew of off-campus speech cases awaiting its consideration.The court requested a response Monday from the West Virginia school district to the certiorari petition filed on behalf of Kara Kowalski, the court docket shows.Kowalski, a former Musselman High School student, was suspended in 2005 for creating a MySpace group that school officials claimed was intended to ridicule another student.The title of the webpage was “S.A.S.H.,” which Kowalski said was an acronym for “Students Against Sluts Herpes.” But posts by other students on the page quickly devolved into disparaging comments about a specific classmate.The 4th U.S.
As “douchebags” case ends, Supreme Court continues to mull off-campus speech rights
It’s the end of the road for Doninger v. Niehoff.The Supreme Court denied Monday the certiorari petition filed by Avery Doninger’s attorneys, effectively ending three years of legal wrangling in a period that saw the rise of a host of off-campus, online student expression court cases.Attorney Jon Schoenhorn called the news a “disappointing end” to the case but even more concerning for the larger precedent.“My biggest concern is that it’s going to chill the free expression of thousands of students because of an erroneous reading of it by school officials,” Schoenhorn said.As a junior at Connecticut’s Lewis B.
More developments for student expression at the high court
We're not even two weeks into the Supreme Court's term and there are already several important developments to tell you about.
Justices set to address student media issues as Supreme Court begins new term
The U.S. Supreme Court began its October 2011 term this morning, kicking off what could be a major season for the student media.
Why Time Magazine is wrong about New Jersey’s cyberbullying law
In the latest edition of Time Magazine, author and Yale law professor Adam Cohen presents an overly simplistic portrayal of New Jersey's new "cyberbullying" law as a "model" for the nation.Cohen's method of analysis, which typifies the reasoning of many state legislators, can be reduced to this: "Bullying is a big problem.
Federal court says Nev. student’s instant messages no laughing matter
At a comedy club, a bad joke can get you booed. At school, a bad joke can get you expelled.Landon Wynar was a student at Nevada’s Douglas County High School in 2008 when he and a friend had several Internet conversations in which he discussed shooting schoolmates and compared himself to Seung-Hui Cho, the gunman behind the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre.
Survey finds majority of Americans support students’ online speech rights, scholastic press freedom
The good folks at the First Amendment Center are out with their annual State of the First Amendment survey for 2011 this morning.