The Manteca Unified School District has proposed a new media relations policy that would require the news media to register at school offices immediately upon entering school property when school is in session.
At first glance, that may sound reasonable. In fact, most of the time, reporters and photographers already politely check in at the office when they visit schools.
But a closer look at state law shows that this proposed policy is in violation of the California Penal Code. Members of the news media are among those who are specifically exempt from the requirements to register at the school before entering.
Why is this important? The public has a First Amendment right to know what's happening at public schools, and when the media's access is restricted, the news is restricted.
I just attended a meeting with the Manteca school superintendent, two board members and six other representatives from the Sun Post, Stockton Record and Modesto Bee. We media folks argued our case for access, but the school representatives defended their proposed policy.
The school board will vote on the matter later this month.
1 comment:
While you are right in this argument, there are much more serious obstacles to our "First Amendment right to know."
The most insidious examples come when journalists, pressed for time and under multiple pressures to "be fair," will take whatever a public figure says and print that as news. That is not news. That is only the newpaper acting a the PR spokesperson for our public officials.
I wrote to both the Sacramento Bee and San Jose Mercury News this week, taking them to task for running a story from AP Newswire without checking it for bias. The journalist, Erica Werner, had done just that. She reported what a congressman said without answering the question of whether that statement made sense or not. In her case, it did not.
We were cheated on the truth.
Posted by: Wes Rolley at November 7, 2005 06:17 PM
Great blog.
Posted by: Adam Miller at November 25, 2005 04:24 PM
This, indeed, is a tough one and one that I have no clear and easy answers to. While the public does have a right to know does it have the right to intrude on the privacy and security of minors?
First, on the privacy side, are we to assume that our minor children have all the information necessary to reach a factual conclusion? Furthermore, is the public's right to know greater than the rights of the other children present to be provided an education in an environment free from the obvious social pressures involved by having news media on campus?
Secondly, on the security side, with the advent of modern technologies, it is extremely easy, frighteningly, in fact, for someone to pose as news media and thereby gain access to our children for their own purposes.
I recently had a discussion with my son regarding the placement of Internet video cameras at our schools that might allow parents to monitor their children while at school. He posed the question, "Do you really want to provide such information to the perverts of our society who could monitor these children and possibly bring them to harm?"
In the raising of this question, I am forced to ask, "Do we really want to give our news media unfettered access to our children when it is so very difficult to verify the credentials of such a person?"
In a world that today seems to be filled with social terrorism of one type or another, perhaps it is necessary for all of us to rethink the wisdom of our laws that give the media en-mass such liberties. I am quite sure a compromise can be reached that will facilitate the public's right to know and still maintain the security of our children in their schools.
Posted by: Dave Hardesty at November 30, 2005 08:40 AM
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