All the News That’s Fit to Print? : High School Papers Still Test Limits After Court Ruling

In the last several months, the Mustang campus newspaper at San Dieguito High School ran stories on the issue of students accused of beating up people off-campus, featured the economic plight of Central American immigrants, and editorialized against a military draft and bland social justice pronouncements from the Pope.

The Poway High Iliad criticized the value of the current drug education programs on campus, pointed to misleading statements used by military recruiters, and ran a pro-con debate on whether students with AIDS should be allowed to remain on campus.

At Hoover High in East San Diego, The Cardinal took a teacher to task for threatening a student’s eligibility to participate in a sport, asked why school district officials do not give equal standing to holy days of Buddhism and other religions as they do to those of Christians and Jews, and highlighted disagreement over new campus rules limiting places where students can eat lunch.

And the Smoke Signal at El Cajon Valley High weighed in with its own pro-con exchange on AIDS students, debated the need for health clinics on high school campuses, and covered methamphetamine labs in East County, all while carrying out an editorial effort to improve the school’s self-image.

Not exactly the powder-puff journalism sometimes imagined for high school papers, although all the papers featured stories as well about student achievers, sports and clubs, and upbeat events taking place on their campuses.

However, in light of last month’s U.S. Supreme Court decision that upholds the power of public school authorities to control the content of high school newspapers, some supporters of the student press worry that the days of crusading journalism may be over.

The court held that First Amendment rights do not require a school to print whatever the students write if, in the view of school administrators, the barring of such material would serve a “valid educational purpose.”

The decision itself will have no immediate effect in California, where the state Education Code allows censorship by school officials only in cases of probable libel, slander or obscenity, or where an article encourages students to break the law or otherwise disrupt a school’s educational mission.

But the Supreme Court ruling could allow state officials to make their statute more restrictive, if desired. And in its broadest sense, some people fear that it will chill the aggressive spirit of high school journalists everywhere.

Such a general chill does not appear to be in the offing at several schools countywide visited during the past several weeks. At most schools, the students and their newspaper faculty advisers show no signs of backing away from continuing to cover all issues, positive and negative, that they believe relevant to their campuses.

At all the schools visited, however, students and administrators emphasized that the quality and breadth of the campus paper depend largely on the ability of students to produce strong writing and the willingness of the principal to allow free rein with only minimal oversight. No matter the state law, a principal or journalism adviser can still set the tone for an individual paper through either an iron-fisted or velvet-gloved approach.

“My attitude has always been that unless something was (extremely controversial), I am not going to interfere,” Art Pegas, El Cajon Valley principal, said.

“I would give as much leeway as possible to the paper,” San Diego City Schools Supt. Tom Payzant told a group of high school journalists last month following the Supreme Court decision.

“I fear censorship but support those (administrators) who might step in and talk with students before publishing a particular article, to hope they understand the issues concerning libel . . . there are times appropriate for a principal to pull an article but that is an individual decision that must be looked at closely . . .. I would err a bit on the side to preserve the student right to free speech rather than censor.”

A more restricted procedure is the one at Gompers Secondary School in Southeast San Diego, where a cartoon parody last year was judged by the principal to be racist. Now, all articles with a hint of controversy are passed through a special committee of teachers for approval. Adviser Frances Miles sees her goal as “focusing the paper on good news” as a way to lessen longstanding tension on the campus, but Gompers students maintain the result is a much more pallid broadsheet than would be possible otherwise.

Enterprise Reporting

But in general, the differences among San Diego County schools appear to result more from the nature of an individual campus and the popularity of its journalism class rather than from the amount of enterprise reporting allowed by administrators. Just as the San Francisco Chronicle has a different tone than the Sacramento Bee or The San Diego Tribune, school newspapers reflect the interests, economic background and diversity of their student bodies.

At San Dieguito High, instructor Judy Grear’s journalism students have a wide latitude to decide among themselves what they will and will not print, and their coverage ranges widely over world issues as well as those involving the school directly.

“As long as our stories have an appropriate style, I believe we have free rein,” student Jeni Jerome said. “The administration trusts us enough not to monitor us.”

Added student Hilary White: “The whole process is not to be biased but to be aware of two sides . . . and with that we should have the chance to write about (everything).”

The Mustang paper has covered the issue of steroids and athletic performance, described what a visit to an abortion clinic is like, discussed student stress, and reviewed cult movies that can have both subtle and not-so-subtle sexual connotations.

The freedom to cover all issues can also bring problems of peer pressure on high school journalists from fellow students. The paper tackled the issue of several San Dieguito students who were charged through the Juvenile Court system with attacks on North County residents at off-campus parties. But the writers asked that their stories run without bylines.

“I didn’t really think I would get (beaten up) but I didn’t want to cause waves,” said Steve Ritea, who wrote one of the unsigned pieces. “But it’s better to cover these things (factually) and let students know the truth rather than have rumors all over campus.”

Adviser Grear said that “most of our conflicts” within the class result from style shortcomings. “The pressure is on me, since I almost never go to the principal unless the story is on a particularly sensitive issue,” she said. “We are on deadline every five days and we have things happen that are terrible (in terms of a headline or writing) but our mistakes are not intentional . . . these are kids, not professionals.

Taking the Heat

“But I think the kids are much harder on themselves than I am . . . we can be interesting without being tasteless.”

At Poway, adviser Barbara De Luca said that principal David Hughes has never asked to see the paper in advance of publication, although he frequently takes the heat subsequently from teachers and the community depending on articles. Last year, a front-page editorial calling for birth control information to be disseminated on campus engendered a harsh response from Poway school board members who thought the article inappropriate.

This year, an editorial criticizing ethnic minorities, particularly blacks, for not making more of an effort to mix within school and society resulted in strong reaction.

“I was called in (by administrators) and it was strongly suggested we run (any) letters to the editor (sent in) to reply,” De Luca said.

Nevertheless, Poway students point to such incidents as proof “that we have a lot of trust from the administration,” as Mara Weiss put it. New students to the journalism class such as Marco Mendoza say that they arrive already familiar with the Iliad’s image as a paper that keeps the school and Poway community informed, “no matter how controversial.”

Steve Wrenn added proudly that he overheard two priests discussing a recent issue at the Poway restaurant where he works part-time.

But the students worry that with a different administration, their successors could labor under the heavy hand of a less-sympathetic principal. “I think that a lot of teachers and administrators are afraid of students educating each other (through the paper),” John Schuhl said.

At Hoover High, the city’s most multi-ethnic campus, the paper focuses tightly on individual school issues, such as whether a Christian social group called Campus Life should be allowed to recruit on campus, how teacher morale is affected by the lack of a district-wide contract, and the facts behind an assault on a teacher by a student while in the school’s detention center.

“We sit around and ask ourselves what is and what is going to be news on campus,” Dennis Childs said. “And if it is controversial, it doesn’t matter.”

Student Alex Gradilla said that as much as possible he believes that the school newspaper should “tell the students what is going on as straight news, not just to hack away at things by choosing up sides.”

Another Hoover journalist, Van Luong, said that students should be allowed the freedom “to write, to learn responsibility for ourselves, and to learn when we go too far . . . if you set up limits, then you don’t allow us to learn responsibility.”

But Luong added, “Why do we then censor ourselves? Well, we have a future too and don’t want to jeopardize it,” referring to controversy two years ago when the then principal refused to allow upset journalists to put out a special issue on the reasons behind numerous trees on campus being cut down.

Giving Things a Try

“I’m for giving things a try since we want the school to have awareness of important issues,” Childs said. “Otherwise, the school gets into a lot of rumors.”

Journalism adviser John Johnson, who is also the school’s athletic director, agrees.

“I take the side of the paper,” Johnson said. “If something is going on around campus and most of the students know about it, then it should be presented in the paper, as long as it is not lewd or biased.”

Johnson’s policy even extends to sports coverage, where traditionally student papers shy away from any criticism. “Of course, we’re not going to denigrate an individual, to hurt someone, because kids are always trying to do their best, but we also want to be up front and critical if deserved . . . if you are O-10, you can’t say the team is having a great year.”

Journalism students at El Cajon Valley High decided among themselves this year to try and nudge students toward a more positive image of the campus. “For years, I think that we have developed an (undeserved) reputation because of the (high transiency) of the student body and thus the community perception that we lack quality,” student Andy Castonguay said. “And as a paper, we feed into the community, so we are trying to print highlights of our school’s programs.”

“I don’t think it’s wrong to do that, either,” Bill Eastman said. Added Archwana Jaiswal, “We encourage as well as inform with editorials on AIDs, teen-age pregnancy, things that are natural for students to read in our paper because it relates to them.

“But if we are going to be negative, we try to do it in a positive way.”

Lynnea Venieris, the El Cajon adviser for the past 20 years, said that the principal is ultimately responsible for everything that goes into a school paper.

“If there is an article that has controversy, I want him to be aware so he knows what will be going on, but I’ve never, ever had the principal say something cannot be printed,” Venieris said.

Castonguay said that while “the administration has been very lenient, they have encouraged us to be responsible which maybe (hasn’t happened) at other schools. We make mistakes but we try to think beforehand how a story or a headline could be interpreted.” Earlier this year, the paper ran a photo of two students who were named “Mr. and Mrs. El Cajon” on the same page as a story on methamphetamines, leading some persons to assume the students were linked with such drug labs.

Much less leeway is given journalism students at Gompers, a 7th-grade through 12th-grade science magnet school in Southeast San Diego with a large, integrated student body. The Phoenix’s most controversial story this year was a news article about the state Legislature turning down a proposal to require women under age 18 to receive parental approval before obtaining an abortion. Although the story was far more timid than articles on related issues of AIDS and birth control that have run in numerous other student papers countywide, the journalism adviser sent the article through a review committee chaired by a vice principal.

“I thought it might be viewed as offensive and inappropriate,” Frances Miles said.

But journalism students believe the procedure is cumbersome and has a deadening effect on the paper.

“If you deny the social aspects of school, you’re denying school itself,” student William Noetling said. “And it takes a lot of time for us to send the articles up.”

“We feel that a lot of students don’t read other papers so this is the only way they can learn about these issues,” Martin Henderson said.

But Miles is adamant about not wanting the paper “as a tool for divisiveness among the student body,” and she calls the journalism students “elitist” for not wanting to do more stories on junior high students and on “positive things that are going on” at Gompers.

Partly as a result of such disagreements, Gompers students continue to print underground newspapers from time to time.

“Underground papers tend to appeal to the really creative students,” Naomi Shanks said. Noetling added that “the Phoenix has real low readership because people think we are too goody-goody.”