Newseum presents 2nd annual Courage in Student Journalism Awards
05.06.99
ARLINGTON, Va. — The Newseum, the interactive museum of news, presented its second annual Courage in Student Journalism Awards today to three students and two recent graduates from two Florida high schools. The awards are given annually to student journalists who have shown determination, despite difficulty and resistance, in exercising their First Amendment press rights.
This year's winners are Brady Ward and Mario Weber, June 1998 graduates of Coral Gables Senior High School, and Isabel Eisner, Joey Ruiz and Katie Townsend, students at Miami Palmetto Senior High School. The five students will divide the $5,000 award check equally, with each receiving $1,000.
The winning students persuaded the school board of Dade County, Fla., to retain its exemplary student press guidelines that have been in place since 1981. The guidelines have served as a model for student press guidelines across the country.
When the Dade County superintendent of schools indicated that he wanted to redraft the guidelines to limit student press rights by introducing a prior review policy (preapproval of student publications by school administrators), student journalists at Coral Gables Senior High School and Miami Palmetto Senior High School immediately responded. They organized a campaign that received extensive news and editorial coverage from The Miami Herald and local TV news shows. The students also gathered hundreds of student journalists around Miami for a rally before a county school board meeting. At that meeting, many of the students spoke eloquently about student freedom of expression and were supported by practicing journalists and journalism professors.
Ultimately, the students' efforts succeeded. The Dade County school board did not redraft its existing press guidelines.
If the policy had been changed, Katie Townsend said that the consequences would be a contradiction between what the students had been taught and what they were allowed to do. "The journalism teachers would be teaching us one thing about being responsible journalists, and then not letting us practice what we'd been taught. With no prior review, students are able to work within the system, not be forced to go outside of it."
Mario Weber added that prior review would take the editorial responsibility out of the hands of the journalist. "No prior review does not mean irresponsible journalism."
The First Amendment rights of student journalists frequently come under attack. More than 500 student journalists and advisers contact the Student Press Law Center (SPLC) in Arlington, Va., each year for legal help with censorship problems. Since 1974, the SPLC has been the only national organization devoted exclusively to providing free legal assistance to high school and college journalists. According to Mark Goodman, executive director of the SPLC, the annual number of requests for assistance has increased 150% in the last 10 years.
The Newseum offers an additional $5,000 award to school administrators who have demonstrated support, under difficult circumstances, for the First Amendment press rights of their schools' student media. No winner of this award was designated this year.
"The Courage in Student Journalism Awards is one of the special ways we celebrate scholastic journalism," said Joe Urschel, executive director and senior vice president of the Newseum. "Nothing could be more appropriate, given our allegiance to the First Amendment, than to recognize the strength of character these individuals demonstrated in standing up for student press rights."
The Newseum is funded by The Freedom Forum, a nonpartisan, international foundation dedicated to free press, free speech and free spirit for all people. As The Freedom Forum's largest public outreach program, the Newseum seeks to educate its visitors about the importance of First Amendment rights in a free society.
For more information about the award presentation ceremony or to schedule an interview with the award winners or a Newseum spokesperson call Kelli Dumas at 703/284-3752.