The policy was adopted July 13 by the Fauquier County Public School Board without the consultation of the adviser or the students, said William Wilcox, former editor-in-chief of Fauquier High's The Falconer. It specifies that student publications are not intended to provide a public forum for students or the general public, and that the school board will be the publishers, the principal the editor and the adviser co-editor. Students appointed by the adviser can serve as assistant editors or reporters.

"What the policy is trying to make us into is a newsletter and a mouthpiece for the school board ... our opinions are not valued and we have to be controlled," Wilcox said.

The principal now has prior review privileges and is instructed to censor any items that "may be considered controversial by some members of the school community," according to the policy.

The students were informed of the policy Sept. 17, the same day Adviser Marie Miller found out it was adopted when she attended an adviser's meeting and a fellow adviser just happened to come across it on the Internet.

"One of the advisers had been poking around on the Web site and came across this policy," Miller said. "It's very demoralizing."

Miler said if this policy remains in place, she is apprehensive of whether students will want to continue working on this paper.

"They won't go out and seek controversy," Miller said. "Over time, I could see this making them look over their shoulders."

The district based its policy on one distributed by the Virginia School Board Association (VSBA). The VSBA develops policies and sends them around to state schools, but it's up to the individual school district to adopt the policy.

Assistant Superintendent for Student Services and Special Education Frank with Fauquier County Public Schools Frank Finn receives a list of proposed new policies or revisions of existing policies from the VSBA. This particular policy, said Finn, came up as a recommended VSBA policy, which is why he introduced it.

"Just in a general way, any VSBA recommended policy we are going to review and consider," Finn said. "We are going to adopt most of the policies based on recommendation if we agree with them. That's not just this policy, that's any policy."

Finn said since this policy is consistent with the Supreme Court ruling in the Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier case, it was clear that the policy should be enforced. He said the ruling gave schools the responsibility for supervision and ensuring that sound journalistic practices are being taught.

But the Hazelwood ruling does not mandate school policy, said Frank LoMonte, executive director of the Student Press Law Center. He said the precedent set by Hazelwood did not require schools to govern their publications with strict administrative control, and that it left open the option of keeping their publications run as public forums, and it said nothing about responsibility for supervision.

"Even under Hazelwood, it goes way too far to declare the principal editor," LoMonte said. "Hazelwood allows the school to step in if the content violates certain standards, but not to contol every discretionary detail."

Wilcox, Miller and other Falconer staff members disagree with the policy and are ready to take action. Wilcox has started a petition with almost 200 signatures, and is protesting the policy publicly through social media Web sites. He is getting as many people as possible to write to the school board and he plans to attend the Oct. 12 school board meeting.