Censorship in school newspapers may seem like a distant memory of court cases in the 1980s, but for many schools, including George Mason High School, fighting censorship is a part of their future. Many school newspapers across the country are censored, and many school districts have policies that permit their principals to censor newspaper articles.
In school newspapers, censorship is when the school administration has to approve each article that goes into the school newspaper, and can pull articles out for whatever reason they see fit. This is what George Mason High School in Falls Church faces. Kate Karstens, head editor of George Mason’s school newspaper, The Lasso, is challenging the censorship policy in Falls Church City School District.
Karstens decided to start fighting the policy on censorship after attending a journalism conference at Columbia University. During a seminar, student journalists were talking about covering sensitive topics in sports.
“I raised my hand and I asked how do I do this with prior review? It’s difficult for me to cover sensitive stories because anything we write that’s too sensitive is either censored or tweaked by administration, and kids looked and me and were like ‘what’s prior review?’” Karstens said.
Karstens realized that in order for The Lasso to reach their full potential, prior review – a euphemism for censorship – has to be gone. She decided to challenge Falls Church City School District’s censorship policy, which follows the ruling of the Supreme Court case Hazelwood School District vs Kuhlmeier. The policy says the principal is the editor of the school newspaper.
“I went to a school board open meeting and I made a public statement really laying out why the current policy we have is detrimental for student journalists, and I actually wrote and drafted a new policy to replace that one and I gave each of the members a copy,” Karstens said.
“Under the policy I have written, the responsibility of the paper is taken away from the school and placed in the hands of the students, under the supervision of the advisor,” Karstens said at the school board meeting.
Karstens’s next steps in getting rid of prior review are to get the school board to propose a motion to have a vote at the next school board meeting. Then she has to get four out of the seven school board members to vote to repeal the policy. After repealing the policy, a new one has to be put in place.
“It’s constant work, I have a whole folder in my Google Drive that’s just prior review work,” Karstens said.
Karstens’s hard work is definitely not in vain. She is getting lots of support in her fight against censorship. The Lasso received a public letter of support from The National Coalition Against Censorship, and legal help from The Student Press Law Center. The Falls Church Way, a parent teacher organization, has also supported The Lasso’s movement and attended the school board meeting. In the Falls Church News-Press there was a letter to the editor saying that prior review needs to be taken away from George Mason. Many community members have supported The Lasso as well.
“It’s just so nice to see that I have so many people in the community standing behind me saying ‘yes, this is a good idea,’” Karstens said.
When asked if having a censorship free newspaper should be a right or a privilege, Karstens said she believes it should be a right for all students.
“It should be a right, I mean look at our constitution, that’s a right that’s given to every single citizen.”
Karstens believes that adults may be afraid to let students practice this right, but if they do not learn how to write without censorship now, it will be too late by the time they get to the real world.
“We’re student journalists because we’re learning about journalism, you can’t learn about journalism with censorship,” Karstens said.
Karstens is planning on meeting with school board members this November. She will continue to take steps to ensure the removal of prior review at George Mason. Karstens has started a battle that will benefit countless students to come. The Lasso and Karstens are a perfect example of students standing up in a professional way to fight for what they believe in.
