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To show their support for the students of Missouri's Timberland High School in their fight against the unjustified censorship of students' journalistic work -- including a ban on any mention or image of tattoos in the newspaper or yearbook -- convention-goers meeting at the National High School Journalism Convention will be asked Friday, April 16, to wear temporary tattoos to celebrate "Timberland Tattoo Solidarity Day."

More than 2,000 temporary tattoos carrying the message "Tattoos are temporary -- ignorance is permanent" will be handed out at the Portland, Ore., convention by teachers and students volunteering with the Student Press Law Center, an Arlington, Va.-based advocacy group that supports the student media in opposing unnecessary censorship of student newspapers, yearbooks, broadcasts and websites.

"School administrators always give the same reason for censoring student journalism -- because they want to protect the image of the school. We want the administrators at Timberland to understand how foolish it makes the school look when censorship goes overboard," said Student Press Law Center Executive Director Frank D. LoMonte, an attorney. " 'Timberland Tattoo Solidarity Day' is a small way for the whole country to come together and let the students at Timberland know that we stand behind them."

Students at public schools such as Wentzville's Timberland High School have First Amendment protections, even in school-sponsored media, that school officials may not abridge without demonstrating a reasonable educational basis. The newspaper at Timberland, The Wolf's Howl, operated successfully and without incident for many years -- winning multiple awards for excellence from the National Scholastic Press Association -- before the school mandated in 2008 that administrators tightly review each paper for potentially objectionable content.

As a result of the censorship, Wolf's Howl adviser Cathy McCandless resigned as journalism adviser as of the end of the 2009 school year. Timberland parents supportive of McCandless and the journalism program attempted to ask the Wentzville Board of Education for help at the Board's March 18 meeting, but were denied the opportunity to speak.

"Timberland High School is a symbol for the nation of why mandatory administrative approval of student journalism never works -- because administrators can't resist imposing their own personal tastes and turning a vehicle for student expression into the school's public-relations newsletter," LoMonte said. "With today's shrinking news media, it is more important than ever that students be allowed to tell the community about what is going on inside of our schools, truthfully and without intimidation."

"There are times when censorship occurs in a gray area and administrators have to make difficult judgment calls, but that's not the case at Timberland. When administrators impose arbitrary and pointless standards, it's the equivalent of the drill sergeant who tells the recruit to dig a hole and then fill it up again. This is not about 'teaching,' it's about breaking the students' will and showing them who's boss," LoMonte said.

"Timberland Tattoo Solidarity Day" is a project of the Student Press Law Center's volunteers and supporters, and is not an official part of the Journalism Education Association / National Scholastic Press Association's spring convention. SPLC volunteers will be asking all attendees at the convention -- students, educators and vendors -- to display the Timberland tattoos on Friday, and the SPLC will post photographs from the event to its Facebook page.

Since 1974, the Student Press Law Center has been devoted to educating high school and college journalists about the rights and responsibilities embodied in the First Amendment, and supporting the student news media in covering important issues free from censorship. The Center provides free information and educational materials for student journalists and their teachers on a wide variety of legal topics.

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