Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/20-255_g3bi.pdf
Page Number: 10.0

Cite as:  594 U. S. ____ (2021) 

7 

Opinion of the Court 

school community. 

We  can,  however,  mention  three  features  of  off-campus
speech  that  often,  even  if  not  always,  distinguish  schools’ 
efforts to regulate that speech from their efforts to regulate
on-campus speech.  Those features diminish the strength of 
the  unique  educational  characteristics  that  might  call  for 
special First Amendment leeway. 

First,  a  school,  in  relation  to  off-campus  speech,  will
rarely stand in loco parentis.  The doctrine of in loco paren-
tis treats school administrators as standing in the place of
students’ parents under circumstances where the children’s 
actual parents cannot protect, guide, and discipline them. 
Geographically speaking, off-campus speech will normally 
fall within the zone of parental, rather than school-related,
responsibility. 

Second,  from  the  student  speaker’s  perspective,  regula-
tions of off-campus speech, when coupled with regulations
of on-campus speech, include all the speech a student utters 
during  the  full  24-hour  day.  That  means  courts  must  be 
more  skeptical  of  a  school’s  efforts  to  regulate  off-campus 
speech, for doing so may mean the student cannot engage
in that kind of speech at all.  When it comes to political or
religious speech that occurs outside school or a school pro-
gram or activity, the school will have a heavy burden to jus-
tify intervention. 

Third, the school itself has an interest in protecting a stu-
dent’s  unpopular  expression,  especially  when  the  expres-
sion takes place off campus.  America’s public schools are 
the nurseries of democracy.  Our representative democracy
only works if we protect the “marketplace of ideas.”  This 
free exchange facilitates an informed public opinion, which, 
when  transmitted  to  lawmakers,  helps  produce  laws  that 
reflect the People’s will.  That protection must include the
protection  of  unpopular  ideas,  for popular  ideas  have  less
need for protection.  Thus, schools have a strong interest in 
ensuring that future generations understand the workings