Background Banner

Jeremy Cole Provides Commentary Regarding Legality of Using Unpaid Student Journalists in University Newsrooms

PDF
| Student Press Law Center
Madison Dudley

Jeremy Cole was quoted in an article for the Student Press Law Center that discusses the practice of higher education institutions utilizing unpaid student journalists and questions whether experience alone is enough to keep students working for independent school papers. Many schools expect students to work long hours for little to no pay, or simply for academic credits and portfolio-building experience. Cole states that, while the Fair Labor Standards Act mandates the U.S. federal minimum wage at $7.25 an hour, “student journalists can easily be categorized in ways that allow the school to not pay them. Examples include classifying a student-run publication as a club, or giving student journalists primary beneficiary status.” The author interviewed several student journalists from across the country, along with a staff attorney and a communications labor union president.

Click here to read the article.

Practice Areas

Industry Groups

Jump to Page

Cookie Preference Center

Your Privacy

When you visit our website, we use cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences, or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. For more information about how we use Cookies, please see our Privacy Policy.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Always Active

Necessary cookies enable core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility. These cookies may only be disabled by changing your browser settings, but this may affect how the website functions.

Functional Cookies

Always Active

Some functions of the site require remembering user choices, for example your cookie preference, or keyword search highlighting. These do not store any personal information.

Form Submissions

Always Active

When submitting your data, for example on a contact form or event registration, a cookie might be used to monitor the state of your submission across pages.

Performance Cookies

Performance cookies help us improve our website by collecting and reporting information on its usage. We access and process information from these cookies at an aggregate level.

Powered by Firmseek