Nebraska School Shuts Down Student Newspaper After L.G.B.T.Q. Publication

On March 31, the primary interval bell at Northwest Excessive College in Grand Island, Neb., had simply rung when the principal walked right into a journalism classroom adorned with punctuation posters to ship a brand new rule straight from directors.

College students, together with a minimum of three who have been transgender, have been ordered to make use of the names they got at beginning for bylines as a result of utilizing their most popular names was “controversial,” in response to a former pupil who was within the classroom and a lawyer for the Pupil Press Regulation Middle.

In response, the coed journalists devoted their ultimate concern in June to L.G.B.T.Q. points, writing two columns on the subject and a information article concerning the origins of Satisfaction Month. Then, after publication, the varsity retaliated, mentioned Mike Hiestand, the Pupil Press Regulation Middle lawyer.

Northwest Public Colleges directors and the superintendent, Jeff Edwards, shut down its newspaper program in June, infuriating pupil journalists and press freedom advocates who’ve denounced the transfer as censorship.

“I believe they mentioned that if they will’t cease it, can’t management it, then they’re simply going to eliminate it,” Mr. Hiestand mentioned of the varsity officers.

The elimination of this system and the coed newspaper, Viking Saga, was first reported by The Grand Island Unbiased on Wednesday. The paper, which had about 15 college students on workers, had been in print for 54 years at Northwest Excessive, which has about 700 college students and is the district’s sole highschool in Grand Island, a small metropolis about 95 miles west of Lincoln, the state capital.

Mr. Edwards and Tim Krupicka, the previous principal, didn’t reply to emails and calls searching for remark final week. Mr. Edwards informed The Unbiased that reducing this system was an “administrative” determination.

Zach Mader, the vice chairman of the Northwest Public Colleges board, declined to remark final week. However he informed The Unbiased that there had been talks of “eliminating our newspaper” if the board noticed content material deemed “inappropriate.” He mentioned that when the ultimate concern got here out, there had been “somewhat little bit of hostility amongst some.”

“There have been editorials that have been primarily, I assume what I might say, L.G.B.T.Q.,” Mr. Mader informed The Unbiased.

Max Kautsch, a First Modification rights lawyer who works on media regulation instances in Nebraska and Kansas, mentioned by telephone that Mr. Mader’s feedback have been proof of discrimination towards a sure viewpoint and censorship.

“The motives aren’t a thriller,” Mr. Kautsch mentioned. “The motives are to squelch the opinion of scholars who really feel positively towards L.G.B.T.Q. motion.”

The shuttering of the paper was the newest occasion of scholars contending with college officers searching for to stop the distribution of yearbooks or the publication of articles, notably in instances coping with L.G.B.T.Q. points.

In Might, college officers in Longwood, Fla., ordered stickers to be positioned over a photograph unfold within the Lyman Excessive College yearbook exhibiting college students protesting a brand new state regulation that prohibits classroom instruction and dialogue about sexual orientation and gender identification in some elementary college grades.

Final August, college officers in Arkansas eliminated a two-page year-in-review unfold from one highschool’s yearbook that talked about the pandemic, the homicide of George Floyd and the 2020 election.

“It’s one thing we’re positively seeing extra of,” Mr. Hiestand mentioned.

No less than 16 states have legal guidelines meant to safeguard college publications from interference. An identical measure died within the Nebraska Legislature this yr.

Marcus Pennell, 18, is a transgender man who was among the many college students within the newspaper class at Northwest Excessive this spring. He graduated this yr and mentioned by telephone that the directors’ determination to close down the varsity’s newspaper was disheartening.

“Actually, I felt so defeated,” Mr. Pennell mentioned.

He added that his journalism instructor, Kirsten Gilliland, who declined a request for remark final week, delivered the information to college students in June, saying: “I don’t know who, or actually why, however that is what occurred.”

Within the ultimate concern, which featured two rainbows on the entrance web page, Mr. Pennell wrote an editorial that appeared below the identify he was given at beginning, Meghan, as dictated by the varsity’s new coverage. In it, he mentioned Florida’s “Don’t Say Homosexual” invoice, writing, “The extra sources college students have out there to place into phrases what they’re feeling, the extra prepared they’ll be for something, or any particular person, that life throws at them.”

College students who had enrolled within the journalism class this fall have been put in different lessons, Mr. Hiestand mentioned. Mr. Pennell mentioned a good friend of his was switched right into a random “animal science class.”

It was unclear if college students and their dad and mom deliberate to pursue litigation within the hopes of reinstating the newspaper and journalism program. Mr. Hiestand mentioned it was “one thing that’s being contemplated, however I believe it’s a methods off.”

Mr. Pennell mentioned he felt dangerous for the scholars who could by no means expertise the joys and strain of deadlines inside Northwest Excessive.

“It might be good if the paper might come again,” he mentioned. “However clearly that’s out of my arms and out of our arms.”