{"id":90789,"date":"2006-11-22T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2006-11-22T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/2006\/11\/22\/bad-news-from-the-college-campus\/"},"modified":"2024-04-14T04:16:31","modified_gmt":"2024-04-14T09:16:31","slug":"bad-news-from-the-college-campus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/journalism\/2006\/11\/22\/bad-news-from-the-college-campus\/","title":{"rendered":"Bad News from the College Campus"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">College newspapers are such a hot commodity these days they\u2019re disappearing off the newsstands. And that\u2019s both good and bad news.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to a study done by Student Monitor, which conducts market research on the college market, 76% of students report that they read one of the five previous editions of their campus paper during the spring semester of 2005. Those are impressive numbers. If their adult counterparts read newspapers in such numbers, the media world would be very different.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Advertisers, meanwhile, have noticed. A recent piece in the Baltimore Sun reported that given the on-campus clout of college papers, \u201cbig corporations and advertisers are latching onto student run publications.\u201d The story noted, for example, that a subsidiary of MTV had recently bought a company that operates web sites for more than 400 college papers and that a daily paper in Florida had just purchased a student paper at Florida State University.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There is also emerging, however, a dark side to this hot market and the influence that college publications wield on campus. The papers usually are given away in stacks or free racks. And at a growing number of schools the papers are being pilfered, literally stolen from the racks by people\u2014probably students\u2014who are apparently angered by controversial or inflammatory content.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to the Mark Goodman, executive director of the Student Press Law Center (SPLC)\u2014which advocates for student journalists on First Amendment issues\u2014there have been a dozen such reported cases already this school year compared to 20 incidents in the entire 2005-2006 college year.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cI don\u2019t know that there\u2019s any particular thing that\u2019s caused the jump in numbers,\u201d Goodman told the PEJ. \u201cDefinitely the problem exits on an ongoing basis\u2026because in large part, colleges don\u2019t respond to college newspaper theft as an affront to the First Amendment, let alone a crime. That trend, I think, is beginning to change.\u201d<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Some of the recent cases reported to the SPLC include:<\/p>\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\" style=\"margin-top: 0in\">\n<li class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\">More than 4,500 stolen copies of the Kentucky Kernel at the University of Kentucky. The issue contained an article about the alcohol related deaths of several students.<\/li>\n<li class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\">About 1,000 missing copies of The Signpost at Weber State University. The issue featured a story about a professor being investigated for allegedly touching a student inappropriately.<\/li>\n<li class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\">Roughly 1,800 copies of the Arizona State University West Express\u2019s Halloween \u201cspoof\u201d edition missing from newsstands. The issue included risqu\u00e9 and satirical photos, some of which cast student government members in a bad light.<\/li>\n<li class=\"MsoNormal\" style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\">About 700 copies of The Collegian at the University of Tulsa that were stolen were put back on newsstands with unauthorized inserts that included material aimed at the paper\u2019s managing editor. The managing editor had written an article alleging problems with the student government\u2019s allocation of funds.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">What is going on here? \u201cI think it\u2019s a reflection perhaps of what a dismal job our schools have done teaching young people about freedom of expression,\u201d Goodman said.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There are some real financial consequences when large numbers of papers are stolen since the student journalists may have to reprint copies or reimburse advertisers.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There is also a legal response emerging. California has recently joined Maryland and Colorado as states that have criminalized the theft of free newspapers \u2013 a description that applies to the overwhelming majority of school publications.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Goodman, however, isn\u2019t optimistic when it comes to the issue of why students would resort to stealing newspapers in the first place. If students don&#8217;t understand the principles of free expression, something more fundamental may be wrong.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><font face=\"Times New Roman\" size=\"3\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;font-family: Arial\">According to the Student Press Law Center, large numbers of college papers are being stolen from racks and newsstands at an alarming rate this semester. In most cases, the perpetrators seem intent in quashing stories about controversial or unpopular subjects. And one advocate for student journalists thinks it&rsquo;s time for college administrators to crack down on the problem. <\/span><\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":180,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sub_headline":"","sub_title":"","_prc_public_revisions":[],"_ppp_expiration_hours":0,"_ppp_enabled":false,"ai_generated_summary":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"relatedPosts":[],"reportMaterials":[],"multiSectionReport":[],"package_parts__enabled":false,"package_parts":[],"_prc_fork_parent":0,"_prc_fork_status":"","_prc_active_fork":0,"datacite_doi":"","datacite_doi_citation":"","_prc_seo_qr_attachment_id":0,"spoken_article_player_enabled":true,"displayBylines":true,"footnotes":"","prc_watchers":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[374,398,368,332,349],"tags":[],"bylines":[2199],"collection":[],"datasets":[],"level_of_effort":[],"primary_audience":[],"information_type":[],"_post_visibility":[],"formats":[458],"_fund_pool":[],"languages":[],"regions-countries":[],"research-teams":[527],"workflow-status":[],"class_list":["post-90789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-higher-education","category-journalists-1","category-journalists-2","category-media-industry","category-newspapers","bylines-pew-research-center-journalism-media-staff","formats-report","research-teams-journalism"],"label":false,"post_parent":0,"word_count":590,"canonical_url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/journalism\/2006\/11\/22\/bad-news-from-the-college-campus\/","art_direction":false,"_embeds":[],"watchers":[],"table_of_contents":[],"report_materials":"","report_pagination":{"current_post":null,"next_post":null,"previous_post":null,"pagination_items":[]},"parent_info":{"parent_title":"Bad News from the College Campus","parent_id":90789},"materialsOrdered":[],"chaptersOrdered":[],"partsOrdered":[],"partsEnabled":false,"datacite_doi":"","prc_seo_data":{"title":"Bad News from the College Campus","description":"<font face=\"Times New Roman\" size=\"3\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;font-family: Arial\">According to the Student Press Law Center, large numbers of college papers are being stolen from racks and newsstands at an alarming rate this semester. In most cases, the perpetrators seem intent in quashing stories about controversial or unpopular subjects. And one advocate for student journalists thinks it&rsquo;s time for college administrators to crack down on the problem. <\/span><\/font>","og_title":"Bad News from the College Campus","og_description":"<font face=\"Times New Roman\" size=\"3\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;font-family: Arial\">According to the Student Press Law Center, large numbers of college papers are being stolen from racks and newsstands at an alarming rate this semester. In most cases, the perpetrators seem intent in quashing stories about controversial or unpopular subjects. And one advocate for student journalists thinks it&rsquo;s time for college administrators to crack down on the problem. <\/span><\/font>","schema_type":"Article","noindex":false,"canonical_url":"","primary_terms":[],"custom_schema":[],"og_image":0,"indexnow_submitted_at":null,"gsc_index_status":null},"prepublish_checks":{"prc-image-alt-text":{"status":"complete","message":"No image blocks in content.","data":null},"prc-about-this-research":{"status":"incomplete","message":"Add an \"About this research\" details block.","data":null},"prc-paragraph-count":{"status":"complete","message":"Found 11 paragraphs.","data":{"count":11}},"prc-internal-link":{"status":"incomplete","message":"Add at least one internal link.","data":{"count":0}}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"relatedPostsOrdered":[],"bylinesOrdered":[{"key":"571b3f45-d3bf-431e-8a06-2b3145982dff","termId":2199}],"acknowledgementsOrdered":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/180"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90789"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":135684,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90789\/revisions\/135684"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"bylines","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bylines?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"collection","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/collection?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"datasets","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/datasets?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"level_of_effort","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/level_of_effort?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"primary_audience","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/primary_audience?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"information_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/information_type?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"_post_visibility","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_post_visibility?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"formats","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/formats?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"_fund_pool","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_fund_pool?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"languages","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/languages?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"regions-countries","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/regions-countries?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"research-teams","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research-teams?post=90789"},{"taxonomy":"workflow-status","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/workflow-status?post=90789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}