Portfolio 4

ROXANA LOYA
Roxana Loya

Edu 210

20 February 2017

Due to common gang related activities around a large high school in the northeastern

United States, a new policy was added to the school rules and regulations. It was developed with

any relations based on gang symbols. For example, jewelry, emblems, earrings, and athletic caps.

A student, Bill Foster, had no relevance to any gang activity, so he wore an earring to school in

his belief that it was attractive to the girls. As a result, he was suspended for wearing the earring

which led him to filing a lawsuit.

Freedom of speech is defined as the right to express any opinions without censorship or

restraint. In Mr. Fosters defense, he was not associated with any gang activities and was only

wearing his earrings to attract the young ladies in his school. This would symbolize his freedom

of expression, which was taken away from him. According to the case Tinker v. Des Moines,

John and Mary Beth Tinker, ages 13 and 16 respectively, attended public school in Des Moines,

Iowa. They decided to publicly wear black armbands as a symbol of their protest towards the

Vietnam War. When the school principals heard about the decision, they enforced a new rule that

prohibited the wearing of an armband in school; those who would refuse to remove an armband

would be suspended from school until it was removed. The Tinkers were aware of the new rule

and wore their armbands to school anyways. They caused no harm throughout their classes that

day, but towards the end they were returned home and suspended until they took the armbands

off. As a result, their parents filed a law suit and eventually won. As related back to the scenario,
in both cases neither student was directly involved in any conflict and were simply only

expressing their feelings in a no harmful matter.

The school properly added a new policy to prevent any harm or discrimination upon the

students. It was stated that prior to the new policy there were a lot of gang activity in the schools

surrounding. Mr. Foster deliberately went against the policy and decided to wear earrings

anyways. Even though he was not part of any gangs, he was purposely advertising gang related

objects. Wynar v. Douglas County School District was a court cause that happened in Nevada in

2013. Landon Wynar was a sophomore in a Nevada high school who reported owning weapons,

wrote disturbing messages on Myspace about planning a school shooting on April 20. No

coincidence, this was the anniversary of the Columbine High School massacre. The student

claimed to be joking, but the school expelled him for 90 days (Cummings 2015). In regards to

this scenario, both students were aware of the situation before acting upon it. As a result, the

school won this case.

Overall, I am in favor of the student Mr. Bill Foster. He had no history of being involved

in any gang related activities and was wearing his earrings in hope to impress a girl. I understand

the direction the school had their approach because he was violating a policy, but there could

have been an alternative to handle the situation. For example, a warning could have been

understanding for the student to take off the earring. It was a good initial reaction due to the fact

that they were only trying to protect the safety of the other students, but once he was cleared for

having to gang activities, it should have all been dropped and forgotten. I believe the court will

rule in favor of the student and the parents since it is taking away the students freedom of

expression.
Cummings, T. (2015, February). Four cases that test reach of student free-speech rights in age of

cyberbullying. Retrieved February 19, 2017, from

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/mckinney/2015/04/27/four-cases-that-test-reach-of-

student-free-speech-rights-in-age-of-cyberbullying

Tinker v. Des Moines Podcast. (n.d.). Retrieved February 19, 2017, from

http://www.uscourts.gov/about-federal-courts/educational-resources/supreme-court-

landmarks/tinker-v-des-moines-podcast