Research update included students, teachers and parents

Miami, Fla. – Three years after a groundbreaking survey of high school students showed that nearly three-fourths of them don’t know how they feel about the First Amendment or take it for granted, not much has changed.

Despite the increase in First Amendment classes from 2004 through 2006, 74 percent of students do not appreciate the First Amendment, this year’s “Future of the First Amendment’’ survey showed.

This is the second follow-up study funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and done by David Yalof and Ken Dautrich of the University of Connecticut. A 2004 survey, which questioned more than 112,000 students, nearly 8,000 teachers and more than 500 administrators and principals about their attitudes and knowledge about the First Amendment, was the largest of its kind.

The original survey suggested that the more students are exposed to the First Amendment’s rights – freedom of speech, of the press, of religion, of assembly and the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances – and the more involved they are in the news media and student journalism, the greater their appreciation of those rights.

This year’s study, which also surveyed students’ parents for the first time, said that only a small percentage of teachers and parents believe that their high schools have made “a lot of effort’’ toward promoting student understanding of the First Amendment.

“These survey results are disturbing, because they indicate that most young people take the freedoms of speech, religion and press for granted,” says Eric Newton, Knight Foundation’s vice president/journalism programs. “What you take for granted, you don’t protect. What you don’t protect, you may lose.”

Key survey findings:

1. Despite increases in the number of First Amendment classes from 2004 through 2006, nearly three-fourths of students still don’t know how they feel about the First Amendment, or take it for granted.

2. Only a small group of teachers and parents say that their school has made “a lot” of effort to promote First Amendment principles through school activities, conversations and policies.

3. Students support individual free expression rights that directly affect or interest them; they’re less supportive of rights that are less relevant to their lives.

4. Parents, not teachers, have the greatest influence on students’ choice of news sources.

5. More students are turning to the Internet to find their news. Their definition of news isn’t much different than that of their parents.

For the full survey, go to http://www.firstamendmentfuture.org.