SPLC's 2019 college press freedom award winners showcased exemplary watchdog reporting

For excellence in examining how allegations of sexual assault among students were handled on campus – sparked by a criminal case against a then-college trustee charged with sexually assaulting a student, The Linfield Review, at Linfield University, is the recipient of the Student Press Law Center’s 2019 Reveille Seven College Press Freedom Award.

Over a period of five months, The Linfield Review, based in McMinnville, Oregon, investigated and published the testimony of eight students who said they were subject to sexual harassment or assault by their peers, and alledged that the college mishandled their cases or failed to protect them. The reporting began after a now-former trustee was charged with sexually assaulting a student representative during a trustee dinner in February 2019. The student sued him and the college.

The award is jointly sponsored by the Student Press Law Center, the Associated Collegiate Press and Louisiana State University’s Manship School of Mass Communication.

The Manship School funds the $2,000 prize in memory of a group of courageous LSU editors (“The Reveille Seven”) who were expelled in 1934 for publishing criticism of Louisiana Gov. Huey Long. The young journalists were later cleared of wrongdoing and vindicated.

More about The Linfield Review

SPLC helps college journalist get his camera back after it was seized by police

Pablo Unzueta, a student journalist from the Daily Forty-Niner at Cal State Long Beach was covering a racial justice protest in September when he was arrested. Police released him after six hours, but didn't return his equipment. He called SPLC's legal hotline and our attorneys connected him with local pro-bono legal representation, and he was able to get his camera back.

Haskell Indian Nations University administration must rescind unconstitutional directives to student editor

SPLC joins the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education and the Native American Journalists Association in demanding that HINU President Ronald Graham rescind unconstitutional threats toward the editor of the student newspaper including forbidding the student newspaper editor from interviewing government agencies and from “attack[ing]” any student, faculty, or staff member by criticizing them.

Read the letter

Q: One of my classmates, a high school junior, has written a column about being tested for COVID-19. It’s well-written and informative. She talked it over with her parents and wants to use her name. Are there any problems with this or should she write anonymously? Any HIPAA issues?

A: There is no problem with the student writing this under her own name, particularly if she’s discussed the issue with her parents. Unlike something like an STD test, for example — which can carry a stigma in certain situations — there’s nothing embarrassing or “shameful” about being tested for COVID19. Getting tested if one believes they’ve been exposed is the honorable and brave thing to do these days.

If you wanted to be super safe, you could have her sign a consent form.

There are no HIPAA issues.

See previous answers

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