Student Newspapers Face Increasing Censorship From University Administrators
Administrators don’t like being the subject of news.
It is amazing that America’s institutions of higher education have so many issues with free speech.
Inside Higher Ed reports:
Student Press Under Pressure
Student news organizations face threats of censorship and intimidation from university administrators, sometimes in the form of budget cuts in the wake of unflattering articles and sometimes with the firings of faculty advisers who encourage aggressive student journalism. These are the findings of a report released today called “Threats to the Independence of Student Media.”
The report aggregated instances of administrative pressure on student media organizations from incidents gathered by the Student Press Law Center and surveys from the College Media Association. The study is a joint effort of those two groups, the American Association of University Professors and the National Coalition Against Censorship.
The publication is not meant to be a quantitative measure of threats to student press freedom, but rather a list that shines light on the sometimes confrontational relationships between student media and university administrations, said Hank Reichman, professor emeritus of history at California State University at East Bay and chair of the AAUP’s Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure.
The report cites seven examples in which faculty advisers of student news organizations lost their jobs after reporters pursued controversial stories.
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