With the passage of the federal FOSTA Act and in several states of "porn is a public health crisis" resolutions, the past three-plus years have been particularly hard on free sexual speech—and few know that better than one of the nation's premiere anti-censorship organizations, the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC). That anti-censorship fight has become even harder with the inability of interested people to gather due to the coronavirus-inspired stay-at-home orders, so as millions of students and teachers adjust to virtual learning in response to that ordered lockdown, NCAC has launched its Virtual First Amendment Classroom.
The Virtual First Amendment Classroom offers teachers the opportunity to host virtual presentations from NCAC's staff of experts on free speech and the First Amendment. Created with curricular goals in mind, the sessions are interactive, offering a presentation of principles and relevant case examples and then asking students to examine how they would apply First Amendment principles to specific situations.
NCAC staff will work with teachers to tailor sessions to the needs of individual classrooms and levels of instruction (including specific content for AP US Government & Politics classes). The sessions range from basic principles like what is considered “speech” and when and how the government can control speech, to nuanced conversations around student speech rights in schools and issues around offensive and hateful speech.
Session topics will include student speech rights, symbolic speech, free speech fundamentals, offensive speech, and limits on free speech.
For more information, contact Gordon Danning at [email protected].
