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Joseph Frederick, who was suspended from high school for two weeks in 2002 for displaying a sign reading “Bong Hits 4 Jesus,” has settled his lawsuit against the school for $45,000.
Frederick displayed the sign while gathered with fellow students to watch the passing of the Olympic torch. The event took place during school hours but off school property, and his lawsuit reached the Supreme Court in 2007.
In a splintered 6-3 decision, the Court rejected the proposition that Frederick’s sign was protected by the First Amendment, but Frederick’s lawsuit continued in Alaska state court.
Under the terms of the settlement, Frederick’s suspension will be expunged from his school records, and the school district will host a forum on student speech and the constitution.
The Volokh Conspiracy comment thread about the adjunct prof fired for publicly identifying suspected plagiarizers seems to be dying down, but it saw a really interesting series of exchanges about campus honor codes yesterday. (I also weighed in on the ethics of the prof’s actions over there, if you’re interested.)
An adjunct professor at Texas A&M International University has been fired for publicizing the names of six suspected plagiarizers.
In 1969, student protesters destroyed a 2500-year-old Egyptian sarcophagus on display at the École des Beaux-Arts de Montreal.
For the last four decades the pieces of the coffin — eight large fragments and hundreds of smaller shards — have been in storage, but three months ago, conservators began the work of restoring it and the mummy it housed. The sarcophagus will be featured in a museum exhibit that opens in December, and will then be returned to the college, now part of the University of Quebec in Montreal.
Google and scholarly searches have turned up no information about the 1969 protest in which the sarcophagus was damaged, or about how the damage took place.
Our campaign was not hatched in the halls of Washington. It began in the backyards of Des Moines and the living rooms of Concord and the front porches of Charleston.
It was built by working men and women who dug into what little savings they had to give 5 and 10 and 20 to the cause.
It grew strength from the young people who rejected the myth of their generation’s apathy, who left their homes and their families for jobs that offered little pay and less sleep.
It drew strength from the not-so-young people who braved the bitter cold and scorching heat to knock on doors of perfect strangers, and from the millions of Americans who volunteered and organised and proved that more than two centuries later a government of the people, by the people, and for the people has not perished from the Earth.
This is your victory.
–Barack Obama, November 4, 2008.
studentactivism.net 
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