As finals week continues, numerous students have viewed hundreds of tweets and Facebook posts concerning their upcoming tests. At first glance the posts seem harmless — silly jokes used as a tool to deal with stress — but after a closer look many of these comments appear to be rather harsh. For example, I received one mass-email stating “Finals can suck one!” and I viewed another post that blatantly degraded a student’s religion class and professor.

This got me wondering, “What if a professor saw this?” I know numerous professors who are on Facebook, and I’m currently following one on Twitter, so I was curious how often these faculty members come across such remarks and what are the consequences?

This occurrence is not unique to Iowa State either. There are numerous cases of students harassing each other or their school faculty through social networking sites in a phenomenon termed cyber bullying. Many would argue these cases of cyber bullying can be considered harassment and that the school should have the right to punish students for such hurtful words. Others argue the students are shielded from punishment by their First Amendment rights. So having just passed “First Amendment Day” last month at Iowa State, I decided to look into it.

After researching the topic for quite some time, I have come to the personal conclusion that schools cannot constitutionally punish these activities. School staff does not have the jurisdiction to punish activities off school grounds and these forms of abuse are not causing a legitimate disruption conflicting with a student’s right to education and thus the school has no authority to take action in these cases.

Firstly, a school’s jurisdiction only covers school grounds. Activities off-campus cannot be judged by a principal unless it represents a blatant threat to the school (such as a bomb threat). For example, if a student were to drink underage off a high school’s campus, the school cannot act out against this action because the illegal action does not take place on school grounds or deal with school matters. In such situations, it is up to the parents or the local government to take appropriate measures. Those who disagree may point out that a number of states such as Oklahoma, Arkansas and Pennsylvania explicitly allow schools to punish off-campus activity in their cyber-bullying legislation; however, simply because these schools have passed these bills does not necessarily make them constitutional.

Additionally, if the line for punishable off-campus activity is not drawn at blatant threats, the slippery slope argument states that the line would become hard to define. Who could determine what can and can’t be punishable by the school? Could harassment be punished? And who decides what is considered harassment? This forms a slippery slope and soon a school could have the inappropriate amounts of authority off of a school’s campus.

Furthermore, a school cannot take action against harassment unless it is interfering with students’ ability to learn. The 1969 Supreme Court Case of Tinker v Des Moines makes this very clear. In this case, two siblings wore black armbands protesting the Vietnam War to school. The school attempted to punish them for this act, but the Supreme Court rejected the punishment stating it was in violation of the students’ First Amendment rights.

Justice Abe Fortas wrote in the majority opinion that a school cannot punish students based on their speech unless it “materially and substantially [interferes] with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school.” In other words, the purpose of schools is to educate, so punishment is withheld until that purpose is being jeopardized.

Opponents of my argument, may state that cyber-bullying has resulted in failing in school, avoiding class and contemplating suicide in the past, but again, I believe that if harassment is occurring, it is up to parents or the local government to intervene, not the school and thus this argument does not apply.

Being a speech communications major, I have investigated our First Amendment rights numerous times for various assignments throughout my time at Iowa State. Hence, having learned and researched our rights to free speech, I believe students have the right to state almost anything they want on the Internet, even if they are insulting others. Although I don’t encourage students to post “Finals can suck one!” on Facebook, I believe that is certainly within their constitutional rights. So next time you see a tweet verbally bashing or abusing a professor, however distasteful a comment may be, I recommend a spirit of thankfulness understanding that our country has fought hard to allow such freedom.