Seattle Press on Line - Citizens' Group Demands Commercial-free Schools

Citizens' Group Demands Commercial-free Schools

Sep 06, 2000 -- When the Seattle School Board holds its first meeting of the new school year, it will have to deal head-on with an issue it has glossed over in past years: advertising in schools. The Citizens' Campaign for Commercial-Free Schools (CCCS), a new grassroots group made up of parents, teachers and others who want to get advertising out of public schools, plans to turn out in force.

The meeting will be held on September 6 at 7 p.m. at 815 4th Ave. N. and is open to the public.

"The School District seems to have a de facto policy of advertising in schools even to children in primary grades," says Deborah Niedermeyer, parent of a first-grader at the new Stanford International School. "This situation is not innocuous; these young children are very vulnerable to manipulation by advertisers." Niedermeyer and her husband Brian Allen are especially concerned with any contract that would expose children to Internet banner ads. They will request that their child not participate in school computer activities in which he would be exposed to the ads.

In January 2000, the Seattle School District made a deal with N2H2, a provider of Internet filtering services. N2H2 provided computer hardware valued at $13,990 and in return is allowed to post banner ads on all web sites accessed by students at school, including sites created by students and teachers. N2H2 is also permitted to collect data from students' online sessions continually.

This is just the latest in a string of concessions made to corporations. Channel One, a made-for-schools television program, is shown every day in 10 Seattle schools. The broadcast includes commercials. Last year, the district signed at exclusive, five-year agreement with Coca-Cola Co.

Also last year, Schools Superintendent Joseph Olchefske proposed that advertising space be sold on school building walls, an idea that was later dropped amid an outpouring of public protest.

"Public schools are public property, and using them to increase corporate profits is a mishandling of public funds," says David Wall, president of CCCS and parent of two children in Seattle schools. "This is exploitation of children, pure and simple."

For more information, contact CCCS at (206) 726-4142, or at www.scn.org/cccs.

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