Life and Deatherage: Less free speech in high schools

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Less free speech in high schools

Another high school student, this one in normally-progressive Minneapolis, is suspended from school twice and transferred to another school for daring to put up a Web site -- on his own time -- that criticizes school officials and policy. The criticism at SouthHighSucks.com isn't even that severe, but administrators took an obviously-joking "poll" as a threat. It asks visitors if a school administrator more closely resembles a witch, a dead body, or Big Bird.

Every time students with their own Web sites have come in front of courts because of school suspensions or discipline for expressing their thoughts, courts have ruled with the students, sometimes with hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages since administrators who dislike criticism often sabotage these students -- withholding diplomas, refusing to allow make-up work for suspensions and forcing bad grades on transcripts, etc. The only exception has been a case where a student actually threatened someone on his Web site.

South High says asking if a teacher looks like a dead body is an obvious physical threat that merits severe discipline. South High needs to offer more civics classes or, even better, have the staff take some. It was bad enough to suspend student Christopher David for expressing his opinion just because an administrator didn't like it, but it was inexcusable and blatantly unconstitutional when the administration suspended him a second time because he posted details of his discipline and linked to a copy of the First Amendment. Everyone has free speech rights, and it amazes me how many school administrators want to change that. What do students learn when free expression is silenced by threats?

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