2022 GSPA First Amendment Essay Winners selected
/The Georgia Scholastic Press Association congratulates the following winners of the 2022 First Amendment Essay contest:
First Place: Courtney Suber, North Springs High School
Second Place: Sarah Meiselman, North Springs High School
Third Place: Riley Ramsey, Clarke Central High School
Judged by a panel of First Amendment experts, these essays exceptionally and uniquely addressed the following prompt:
Do you believe that public schools should be able to punish students for their off-campus speech? This was the question addressed by the U.S. Supreme Court in Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L.(2021). Some people say “yes,” schools should be allowed to punish off-campus speech for purposes such as protecting students from bullying or preventing disruptions at school. Others say “no” because it invites schools to punish students for unpopular or controversial speech and because off-campus speech is the responsibility of parents to regulate. What are your thoughts on this issue and what arguments support your position?
The judges noted that Suber’s essay “illustrated a thorough understanding of the prompt while providing a unique and personalized perspective. She powerfully described the tensions she faces as a teenage girl and how school punishment of off-campus speech may affect her ability to express herself. Further, her essay was well-written and entertaining.”
The winners will be recognized during the Spring Workshop and Awards on April 11. They’ll receive monetary prizes along with their publications.
1st Place Winning Essay
By Courtney Suber
I think it’s fair to say that teenage girls are vilified in many aspects of our culture. Whether it’s the rampant misogyny or the maturity gap between women and girls, I don’t know, but at the end of the day they’re scorned as many nasty stereotypes. This is observed in tropes like “The Mean Girl” which is showcased in loads of popular western media like “Heathers”, “The Craft”, and of course, “Mean Girls”. Being a teenage girl myself I’ve been forced to ask… are these girls really evil? Or just misunderstood? And I’ll tell you, upon reading up on Mahony Area School District v. B.L. (2021), I asked myself the exact same question. I believe that B.L. was not in the wrong when expressing her emotions, and did not deserve suspension any or bombastic punishment of the likes.
Why is it that B.L. couldn’t vent her emotions out on her own social media account? Why was she immediately vilified for expressing anger to quite the angering situation? I play a high school sport as well, and the number of posts I have made crying out of anger at the hands of my coaches is quite impressive. What if I was taken to court for my sporadic posts of somberness? Upon hearing of B.L.’s situation, I wondered why it was such a big deal.
SCOTUS argued that although school’s may regulate student’s conduct on campus, their First Amendment rights are not waived once the student enters campus. The events where a student may be reprimanded are if they exhibit lewd language, promote illicit drugs on school trips, or there is reasonable proof that the student may plan to bear arms. SCOTUS also claimed that off-campus speech is a parental rather than an institutional responsibility, therefore voiding the school of potential to reprimand B.L.
I believe that the Supreme Court was correct in their ruling. Why is it that an institution feels entitled to engage in the personal views of students, even if published online? Because it is something that they may deem offensive? From a legal standpoint, if B.L. did not express lewd language on campus, promote drug use on a school trip, or express that she may bear arms, what grounds are there to sentence her to punishment? Teenage girls should be and are allowed to openly express their emotions without being riddled with negative stereotypes that some may even find grounds to suspend her upon.
At the end of one of the aforementioned movies, our protagonist B.L. would come out victorious, and demonstrate that even through her misinterpreted messages, she’s able to speak her mind. She would void villainization and mean girl tropes, and show that she is entitled to speech and the embracing of herself just like any other young American.
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To read the second and third place winners, please follow the links below.