InsideHigherEd.com reports today that The Corsair, the award winning student newspaper at Pensacola State College,is locked in a battle with the school’s administration in its effort to report on the collective bargaining negotiations with the faculty.
“Administrators at a Florida community college are leaning on faculty and student journalists to prevent coverage of an ongoing labor dispute,” wrote reporter Ry Rivard. “In doing so, they are adopting a questionable interpretation of Florida law that could be used to squelch student journalism in high schools and colleges across the Sunshine State.”
According to Rivard, administrators have told faculty members they are violating state law by speaking with student journalists about contract negotiations, which are currently at an impasse. PSC administrators are using a section of state code, which prohibit unions from using students to promote union activities, that Rivard wrote has been ruled unconstitutional by both a state and a federal court.
An editor and reporter at The Corsair disagree. The terms under which faculty work are likely to affect students at the college, they told Rivard. “The whole thing together could affect the students if it affects the teachers,†said writer Abigail Megginson.
The controversy began when the paper’s editor, Spenser Garber, published on Oct. 31 an article on the labor impasse. The same day, an attorney for the college wrote a letter to the faculty union, the United Faculty of Florida, that said it was inappropriate for union members to speak with student journalists about union business.
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