Asbury Park Press: Free press hot topic

Prof. Bosley and three Viking News editors discussed their battles with the Ocean County College administration in a story published Sunday by the Asbury Park Press...

Free press hot topic
Students, advisers walk fine line at college newspapers

Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 01/22/06

BY JOSEPH PICARD
STAFF WRITER

DOVER TOWNSHIP — Is the free press less free on a college campus? Should it be?

Those are questions the U.S. Supreme Court is being asked to answer, because of a controversy involving a student newspaper at an Illinois university. But those same questions have been raised in the Shore area because of a controversy surrounding the recent removal of the longtime faculty adviser to the student newspaper at Ocean County College.

"I have been removed because the college president does not like what's been written about him in the student newspaper," said Karen Bosley, English professor and, until the end of the spring semester, adviser to the Viking News, the OCC student-run weekly.

"He couldn't punish the students because it would appear too blatant, so he came after me," Bosley said. "It amounts to censorship by intimidation..."

Full story...