Online cyber bullying off-campus is challenging the balance of free speech online and in schools.  Administrators dealing with upset parents are put in positions of exploring disruptions at school caused by mocking YouTube videos and Facebook comments from teens in their critical years of social development.  Parents are seeking support from school administrators to resolve many of the conflicts, but school administrators are debating how much off-campus speech can be addressed by school authority.

Weighing benefits and negatives of legal and ethical considerations before creating an online presence is an important part of expanding student media’s outreach.

Sarah Nichols made strong points with her recent Checklist for Digital Media for advisers to use to get ready for next year.

I’d like to briefly piggyback on that with some points students and their journalism programs need to consider as they create an online presence. Within the points, they should ask themselves these questions:

If I'm just using copyrighted music for my school broadcast, that's OK, right?  No.

I can use up to 30 seconds of any music free and clear because of the "fair use" rule, right? No.

Like many journalistic Web sites, the HiLite Online allows readers to comment on stories. The process of how we post those comments and what legal ramifications, if any, staffs assume that post those comments have been discussed in other articles both on this site and via the Student Press Law Center. This article, on the other hand, will address the decision to allow comments in the first place.

Of late, this issue has been particularly relevant at Carmel High School as student newspaper staff members have navigated the tricky process of covering allegations of sexual harassment and bullying involving members of the men’s basketball team. For most of our online stories, we allow readers to comment. Those comments, which tend to be relatively anonymous, go into a sort of “holding pen” to be approved by editors and posted to the site. For the most part, all comments are approved, unless they are clearly a piece of spam or contain personal attacks or profanity, which are against our stated guidelines.

In the latest report from the SPLC, the Center gives an in-depth look at "Understanding Cybershield Law." It's a great read for any publication that is currently online or ones that are thinking of moving online. It talks about what the courts have said regarding a publication's liability of content posted on its site. It talks about the difference between staff created content and user-generated material and gives some advice on what should or shouldn't be edited from user-generated material.

The piece discusses everything from Cybershield's background and court interpretations to source of challenged content and implications for the student media. It really is worth a look for advisers and students who oversee content on scholastic media Web sites.