Constitutional Rights at school?

[Petey]

Originally Posted by Levin571

I find it quite odd that at schools here in America where students learn about the constitutional rights, like the right of free speech and the right to no unresonable search and seizure, that these rules are bent and broken by the administration to the point where they are essentially nul and void.

For my answer to this, see my previous post.

An example is that I rescently discovered that my boarding school uses a program called "AIM sniffer" to log the AIM messages of all the students on our intranet (both incoming and outgoing). This is a clear violation of both the first and fourth amendments, and even thought cases like this have been brought to court, it still persists.

How is that a violation of those amendments? They are not infringing upon your speech. It is not unreasonable search or seizure, either. You are using the school's network--they may do what they darn well please on their own property!

Another one is the locker inspections that sometimes occur at high schools, where even if there is basis for the search. While this can catch potential crimes or other actions, what about those innocent students who are just bystanders?

Then what have they to hide?

Again, the point is that schools have a compelling interest in that. Read up on some case law to see how the courts have interpreted it. Try www.findlaw.com

I want to know what is the opinion of the CD community on this issue (yes i know it had nothing to do with robotics, but i feel it is a resonable question concidering how many of us are or were students at one time).

My opinion is that schools have the ability to do anything the courts say they can do, and that I will abide by the opinion of the court.

--Petey