Knight Foundation follow-up survey shows classes on guaranteed freedoms are on the rise, but so is student skepticism

MIAMI – U.S. high school students know more about the First Amendment than they did two years ago, but they are increasingly polarized in how they feel about it, according to an update of a groundbreaking survey funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

U.S. high school students are far more likely to take classes that teach about the First Amendment than two years ago, according to the survey. And more students now support protections for the news media. They also are more in favor of their right to report in their own newspapers without school officials’ approval.

But more students today think the First Amendment, as a whole, goes too far in the rights it guarantees. A gap is widening between those who support this fundamental law and those who don’t. And teachers, while themselves increasing their appreciation of the First Amendment, don’t think schools are doing a great job of teaching it.

“We see progress,” said Eric Newton, Knight’s director of Journalism Initiatives, “but there are still serious problems.”

Key Findings
Methodology
Student Survey
Faculty Survey
Quotes and comments on follow-up survey
PDF of follow-up survey

Appreciating Free Speech Starts with Your Teacher

By Alberto Ibargüen

At the time of their awards, Oscar winners and Heisman and Pulitzer winners get headlines. But a few years later, most of us can’t name even a handful of them. Yet almost any of us can name the teachers who really mattered to us, the ones who made a difference in our lives, the ones who lit the fire for learning and pushed us to think for ourselves.  

In looking over the results of a recent survey on what America’s high school students think about their freedoms, I’m reminded of the influence of teachers. Along with parents, they are the ones who will instill in every generation the respect and appreciation for the “Five Freedoms” guaranteed in the First Amendment: freedom to worship as you believe and without a religion endorsed by the government, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly and freedom to ask government to meet the people’s needs.  (Full column)

How Far is too Far?
by Calvin Hall
Assistant Professor and Faculty Fellow
Department of Communication
Appalachian State University

Earlier this week, I was interviewed for one of those ubiquitous go-out-and-interview-an-instructor-or-other-media professional class assignments, and one of the questions the student asked me concerned my thoughts about the future of journalism. I was in “academic expert” mode, more effusive than reflective, and perhaps wanting leave the student – and future journalist – with a sense of hope, I told her that I thought the future was extremely bright.

But I was not being completely truthful. I am, in fact, a little worried about the future of journalism, especially after seeing some of the results of the recent Knight Foundation First Amendment studies. (More)

Adviser: Educators Need to
Recommit to Teaching First Amendment

(Dennis Brown is a journalism teacher and adviser at Huntley High School near Chicago.  Here, he comments about his summer experiences and the new Knight study about high school students and the First Amendment.)

Like most teachers, my summer months were busy. . .I shuttled two children to swimming lessons, worked on many home improvement projects, and prepared for the upcoming school year.

I was given the opportunity to attend the Street Law Supreme Court Summer Institute for Teachers in Washington D.C. The institute, which took place at Georgetown University Law Center, was a five-day seminar on the U.S. Supreme Court. It included sessions led by Supreme Court experts, journalists, authors, and lawyers, all of whom gave me and the other teachers in attendance an in-depth look at the workings of the Supreme Court. <More>