Student sues school for violating freedom of speech

Logan Glover filed a lawsuit against Lafayette High School on Tuesday after he was disciplined for posting photos of 1 of his teachers on Facebook. On Nov. 20th, the sophomore took 7 photos of Jessica Hauser in her classroom while two of his friends distracted her. He posted the photos on Facebook but removed them on Dec. 6, when school officials confronted him about them.

Glover got a three-day, out-of-school suspension and was permanently barred from Hauser's classroom. The other boys involved each got three days of in-school suspension. They are not parties to the suit. "The taking of photographs and posting them on the Internet is not necessarily wrong," said Rockwood Superintendent Craig Larson. "It's the disruption that this caused that prompted us to act."

Mark Sableman, a prominent First Amendment attorney, said the photographs were taken during a free-time period and did not disrupt instruction. He also said, "The First Amendment and prior cases are clear that school officials do not have the right to discipline students for content they post on the Internet outside of school."

Sources:

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/education/story/5799DD323B013
97E862573B10012D942?OpenDocument

Thanks.