High court asked to hear student online-speech case
A former Connecticut high school student punished for speech critical of school officials on her public Internet journal has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear her appeal. If the Supreme Court takes Avery Doninger’s case, it could offer much-needed guidance on when or whether school officials can punish students for online speech created off campus.
Doninger, the former class secretary of Lewis S. Mills High School in Burlington, became upset with Principal Karissa Niehoff and Superintendent Paula Schwartz in 2007 over the cancellation of a proposed student event called Jamfest. In an online message, Doninger referred to Niehoff and other school officials as “douchebags.” As a result of the message, Niehoff barred Doninger from running for re-election for student office. Later the principal also prohibited students from wearing “TEAM AVERY” T-shirts.
Doninger sued in state court, contending that the principal violated the First Amendment by punishing her for off-campus, online speech and for censoring the T-shirts. The defendants had the case removed to federal court.
In a protracted battle in the lower federal courts, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with school officials on both the Internet free-speech claim and the T-shirt issue. The 2nd Circuit ruled that the principal and other school officials were entitled to qualified immunity.
Now Doninger takes her case to the high court. “This case presents important and compelling first amendment issues which impact millions of students and thousands of school officials,” reads her cert. petition in Doninger v. Niehoff.
The petition points out that the 2nd Circuit’s decision conflicts with a pair of en banc decisions issued last month by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — Layschock v. Hermitage School District and J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District. In those decisions, the 3rd Circuit ruled that school officials exceeded their authority in punishing students for off-campus, online speech that did not cause a substantial disruption.
The petition adds that school officials, students and others need guidance in this area of student online speech: “The lack of guidance by this Court to address students’ internet speech, or indeed any kind of off-campus speech, combined with school officials’ inflated fears of school violence, have resulted in improper punishment of many students for otherwise protected off-campus speech.”
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Tags: blogging, Connecticut, Internet, off-campus speech, student expression, student speech, T-shirt
7 Responses to “High court asked to hear student online-speech case”
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Ken Paulson is president and chief executive officer/First Amendment Center. Previously, Paulson served as editor and senior vice president/news of USA Today and USATODAY.com.
Gene Policinski, senior vice president and executive director of the First Amendment Center, is a veteran journalist whose career has included work in newspapers, radio, television and online.
John Seigenthaler founded the First Amendment Center in 1991 with the mission of creating national discussion, dialogue and debate about First Amendment rights and values.
Dr. Charles C. Haynes is director of the Religious Freedom Education Project at the Newseum. He writes and speaks extensively on religious liberty and religion in American public life.
David L. Hudson Jr. is a scholar at the First Amendment Center. Hudson writes for firstamendmentcenter.org and for other publications devoted to First Amendment issues.
Tiffany Villager is director/First Amendment studies at the First Amendment Center, which she joined in 1993. She also served as the center’s research manager and research coordinator, and developed the center’s library.
After reading this story, my thoughts were led to think about slander based upon the term “douchebags”. Many times we do not think about name calling when it comes to students doing the name calling about adults. The focus we should have is keeping everyone safe.
As a 17 year teacher, I have seen students talk on-line about students and adults and the next day, there was a true disruption of the learning environment. A person can say whatever he or she feels but we have to remember that words can fuel a fire. For example, let’s say that there are many students who do not like the principal in this story and all they needed was for someone to ignite the fire. Now the principal’s car has been vandelized one week. Another week the tires are put on flat, and the story could go on and on. Once a fire has been lit, it is difficult to put it out. Just look at the number of homes in California that have been burned because the onset of the fires in the hills started with one house.
Case and point. There were several middle school girls that posted negative things on Facebook about another girl at the same school. These postings esculated into families (yes, adults) coming up to the school to fight the students who posted these negative comments and the parents of the students who started the mess came to the school to defend their children as well.
To say the least, school should not be this difficult. Because we have taken many of the common courtsies out of society, we have erased the line of how we should treat one another.
So as for this story, I think that inciting is criminal. The questions I would like to ask is what was the intention of this student by name calling? Was she trying to incite or letting off steam? However it goes, if we do not recognize intended harm when it is dished out, then what is the purpose and point of educating children to be productive citizens?
Wouldn’t the 3rd or 4th Circuit case be a better vehicle to address the issues, since Justice Sotomayor would have to recuse herself from the 2d Cir. case (she was on the panel), risking a 4-4 split?
[...] the First Amendment Center, David Hudson, Jr. describes the petition in Doninger v. Niehoff, seeking review of a decision by [...]
[...] the First Amendment Center, David Hudson, Jr. describes the petition in Doninger v. Niehoff, seeking review of a decision by [...]
The biggest problem is the lack of respect for the authority of the principal and other school officials, teachers and leaders. The foundation of this problem is rebellion against authority, which is ultimately rebellion against God. When God has been removed from the authority structure of this nation, there is no unmovable standard by which to measure authority. If authority doesn’t come from God, who does it come from? The Constitution was never meant to be considered apart from the foundation of the authority of God. When God says “draw near to God and he will draw near to you”, he means it. When his word says that when we “turn away from God” he will “turn away from” us, He means it.
God has nothing to do with this issue, and in fact has no part in the schools system as part of the separation of church and state.
As to the matter of respect for authority, respect is earned and not given.
In any case my opinion is that the students have the right of it in this case and I hope they win.
[...] the school officials exceeded their authority in disciplining students for off-campus speech. Read this for more on the circuit [...]