Scholastic Press Rights Commission

John Bowen

Current Positions: Adjunct professor in news sequence and assisting in development of online journalism educators’ Master’s program at Kent State; chair Journalism Education Association Scholastic Press Rights Commission; member Student Press Law Center Advisory Council; Webmaster for Center for Scholastic Journalism, Ohio Scholastic Media Association and JEA Scholastic Press Rights Commission.

National Honors: Dow Jones Newspaper Fund National Journalism Teacher of the Year; National Scholastic Press Association’s Pioneer Award; Columbia Scholastic Press Association’s Gold Key Award, CSPA’s Charles R. O,Malley for Excellence in Teaching award and the Ohio Educational Language and Media Association’s Intellectual Freedom Award.

Publications: Co-author of law column in Dow Jones Newspaper Fund Adviser Update; co-author Principal’s Guide; author of numerous magazine and journal articles and author of JEA press rights blog at jeasprc.org. Education: bachelor of science in education and master of arts in journalism from Kent State University.

Statement of Goals: Commission goals for the upcoming years:

• Continue to design and develop commission outreach through use of social media
• Continue to design and develop commission outreach to students, advisers and communities whose journalism programs face censorship and other restrictive issues
• Continue the growth and develop of the 45words group and involvement of more students with First Amendment issues
• Create and maintain a Making a Difference program to showcase multimedia student reporting that made an impact
• Continue and expand the creation of mission statement about key principles of responsible and free journalism for use by students, advisers, administrators and communities
• See that all parts of the country are covered by commissioners involvement so that those needs legal, ethical and other assistance from the commission can receive it.
• To maintain an effective and informative scholastic press rights commission presence on the Web
• Implementation for JEA of a working position on national journalism standards
• To continue JEA efforts with other scholastic media organizations to support and strengthen a national environment for free expression