18 Sep 2014
On Wednesday, Sept. 17, students for the College of Law lead more than 2,300 Lincoln Public Schools eighth-graders through a project to celebrate Constitution Day.
The project is part of the college's Community Legal Education Project, a student run organization that focuses on community outreach. The effort included more than 60 volunteers who talked about the importance and history of the Constitution in eight Lincoln middle schools.
"This is the second year we have worked with Lincoln Public Schools on this Constitution Day project," said Chris Schmidt, a second-year law student and event organizer. "The Constitution gets a bad rap for being this ancient and old document, but we try to get the students to realize it is alive and affecting us every day."
To show how the Constitution remains active, Schmidt said the presentations involved current topics, including debates on the need for school uniforms and if freedom of speech applies to social media posts.
"We think the topic of getting in trouble for what you post online will be a good one to get the students' blood going," Schmidt said. "It's going to be fun to show them what the Constitution says and how it even impacts the lives of 13 year olds."
Law students posed the question: Should a school be able to discipline a student for making an inappropriate comment online even if it didn’t happen at school? Some classrooms said yes, some said no, but most agree that cyberbullying is a problem that needs addressed.
The college's Community Legal Education Project provides law students with the opportunity to teach elementary and middle school students about the Bill of Rights, the Constitution and other legal issues. During the spring semester, law students go into local elementary classrooms once a week for six weeks to teach prepared lessons.