State LegislationProtecting Student Press Freedom: New Voices on the Move Part 1
Channel: Center for Scholastic Journalism
Date: 2017-03-01

Welcome and Introduction
Thor Wasbotten, Director, School of Journalism and Mass Communication, Kent State University
Candace Perkins Bowen, Director, Center for Scholastic Journalism, Kent State University
Amy Reynolds, Dean, College of Communication and Information, Kent State University
Mark, Goodman, Knight Chair in Scholastic Journalism, Kent State University

The Center for Scholastic Journalism at Kent State University hosted the first national symposium to explore the movement for Student Free Press legislation in November 2008.  The assembled group of lawyers, journalists, educators and students had high hopes for a reinvigorated movement supporting student freedom bills in states around the country. But change was slow in coming. It wasn't until 2015 when  North Dakota student free expression law that the momentum began. In 2016, eight years after CSJ held its first legislation symposium, the Center once again brought together a group of national experts to look toward the future of student press freedom laws around the country. This video captures that event. 

Thor Wasbotten has served as director of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication since July 2012. Prior to arriving at Kent State, Wasbotten served as the assistant dean for student media and online operations at The Pennsylvania State University, where he also was a senior lecturer of journalism. Wasbotten's former academic appointments include time as a visiting professor at the Shanghai International Studies University; participation in the Broadcasters-in-Residence Program at the University of Oklahoma; teaching as an instructor at Pacific University; and, as a graduate fellow at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Ore.  

Candace Perkins Bowen, MJE, is associate professor at Kent State University and directs its Center for Scholastic Journalism and the Ohio Scholastic Media Association. Previously, she was a high school journalism teacher/media adviser in Illinois and Virginia. Past president of the Journalism Education Association, she is currently on the board and a member of the Scholastic Press Rights and Certification Committees. Bowen served on the board of the Student Press Law Center and later chaired the Steering Committee of SPLC’s Advisory Board.

Amy Reynolds, Ph.D., joined the College of Communication and Information at Kent State University as dean in July 2015, after serving in leadership and teaching roles at both Louisiana State University and Indiana University. At LSU Reynolds served as the associate dean for graduate studies and research in the Manship School of Mass Communication as well as co-director of the Press Law & Democracy Project, as the Thomas O. and Darlene Ryder II Distinguished Professor and as the director of the Reilly Center for Media & Public Affairs. The focus of Reynolds’ research is on dissent and the First Amendment, First Amendment history and media sociology.

Mark Goodman became Kent State’s first Knight Chair in Scholastic Journalism in 2008 after serving 22 years as executive director of the Student Press Law Center. He has a journalism degree from the University of Missouri, a law degree from Duke University and has received First Amendment Awards from both the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and the Society of Professional Journalists, the Intellectual Freedom Award from the National Council of Teachers of English and the Carl Towley Award—the Journalism Education Association’s highest honor.