By Mike Hiestand
Last time I provided the first batch of quick answers to some of the most common questions asked by high school journalists and their advisers. Here are the last dozen (once again, in no particular order):
1. Generally, you do not have to disclose to a government agency your purpose for requesting a public record.
2. In almost every case, it is best that advisers not know the identity of a student reporter’s confidential source or accept or keep confidentially obtained documents or other material in his or her possession. (As employees of the school, they may, in some cases, have an obligation to reveal such information to their superiors.)
3. It is not necessary to register your student publication (or individual student work) with the U.S. Copyright Office to obtain a copyright. Works produced today are automatically copyrighted from the moment they are created.
4. If an allegation is true – and if you can prove that it’s true – you cannot be successfully sued for libel.
5. Except in extraordinary cases, school officials have little authority to punish students for their after-school speech on private, off-campus websites. (Of course, students remain fully responsible – and potentially liable – for anything that they publish. It’s not, however, the job or prerogative of school officials to enforce the rules 24/7.)
6. There is no age limit for using freedom of information law. (Louisiana, the last state to have such a restriction on their books, eliminated it in 2004).
7. Courts have found that minors can provide lawful consent that allows news media to publish otherwise private information about them as long as they are capable of understanding the nature and consequences of their consent. As a general rule, this means most high school-aged students can probably provide valid consent.
8. Names, titles, short slogans, lists of ingredients and familiar symbols are a few categories that cannot, by definition, be copyrighted. Therefore – if you feel a need – you can, for example, use the words “the days of our lives” or “oh, the places you’ll go” as the theme or a section header for your yearbook. You may cross the line, however, if – in addition to the “bare” words – you also include references to the NBC soap opera or the Dr. Seuss book with which those words are commonly associated.
9. School officials do not have more authority to censor or limit in-school distribution of an underground student newspaper solely because it contains advertising.
10.Tape recording a telephone conversation that you are part of without the other party’s consent is currently legal in 38 states and the District of Columbia. Twelve states generally require the consent of all parties to the conversation. (Check out “Can We Tape?” for more information.)
11. Where it applies, the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) only restricts school officials – not student journalists acting on their own – from disclosing information about students without student (or parental, if the student is a minor) consent.
12. Unless they have played an independent role in its publication, parents of student journalists are generally not liable for material their children publish.
That’s the last of them. As before, it’s important to keep in mind, though, that these legal “bytes” are just that. They should point you in the right direction, but if you’d like to dig in a bit deeper, more information about the topics above is available on the SPLC website or by contacting the Center directly.